


Hang the DJ (Black Mirror AU)

by Waxa



Series: Clexa Week 2018 [6]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Black Mirror AU, Clexa Week 2018, Clexaweek2018, Day 7, F/F, Free day, I made it, Ignore all the typos, hang the dj au, just in time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-04
Updated: 2018-04-03
Packaged: 2019-03-26 19:29:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 25,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13864458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Waxa/pseuds/Waxa
Summary: Day 7 ClexaWeek2018: Free day.A Black Mirror AU from season 4 episode 4 “Hang the DJ”-Paired up by a dating program that puts an expiration date on all relationships, Lexa and Clarke soon begin to question the system's logic.





	1. Lexa

**Author's Note:**

> I made it, just barely. Please ignore all the typos. I will fix it, some time soon. 
> 
> This is a re-telling of my favorite episode of Black Mirror. If you haven’t watched it yet then go, see it, please. It’s phenomenal. 
> 
> It’s a two part fic. One from Lexa’s point of view and the other from Clarke. I'll post Clarke's point of view tomorrow. 
> 
> Hope you like it.

**Lexa.**

It’s almost night time, and she doesn’t know where to go from where she is or what do either. She pulls out the little white device from her coat and fiddles with it. “Coach?” Lexa asks out nervously.  The only light comes from the device as it wakes up.

_Yes, Lexa?_

The AI voice is smooth and not robotic at all; she even goes as far as having a light English accent that makes it sound, elegant.

“Where do I go?” Lexa looks around; she sees nothing but a winding road, surrounded by trees and silence.  

_Proceed to the hub._

“Got it,” Lexa says, returning the device to her pants.

She continues to walk until out of nowhere there’s a valley of lights in the distance and the more she gets closer, the more she knows it wasn’t there a minute ago. A city or the distant but clearly lights is where she’s supposed to go and so she continues on her way.

The hub is a modern looking steel structure, it verges onto a shaped candle sort of building, with shimmering light and people, mostly pairs coming and going from different levels under the dome roof. It seems quite new and odd but familiar in a way, but still Lexa can’t remember ever being in this place.

Maybe in another life.

She walks down the polished hallway while she glances around nervously, before she finds her way amidst the throng of people hanging around that seem to be following the same path.

The restaurant at the top of the building is intimate, with dim lights, mouthwatering smell from the food and soft music and couples mingling in dark corners near the bar, laughing and enjoying the experience that the program offers.

Lexa walks in slowly, scanning the crowd for an unfamiliar face or a familiar one. It’s mostly the latter one so she can know what to do, but soon is replaced by the former one since she hopes it’s a face she will become familiar by the time the night is over.

She finds an empty circular table set for two among the dozens of others that look identical to it but are occupied.

She sits alone, with nothing to do but hope and wait.

_Hope_ mostly.

* * *

There’s a woman, a beautiful blonde woman seemingly searching for her date and Lexa hopes she’s searching for her. She prays whatever is out there that she’s the one.

So she doesn’t expect her to smile at her and her coach beeping saying that she was at the right table and that her date just arrived.

“You’re the one,” Lexa practically yells, standing abruptly and promptly sending a fork cascading across the floor. The noise it makes echoes around the round noisily, and the girl looks around mildly amused and embarrassed to see if anyone else is watching them.

Lexa stumbles awkwardly to pick up the rogue silverware, before turning sheepishly to face the blonde. “Sorry!” Lexa apologizes and then says “Fork,” holding the fork up for the blonde to see.  Lexa’s cheeks are red, and she’s definitely flustered, but she manages to smile when she sees amusement in blue eyes.

“Clarke,” The blonde replies with a smile, she points herself in introduction and that’s when Lexa realizes her mistake.

“Oh, no, my name’s not fork!” she’s quick to correct, tossing down the object in question rather loudly on the table. “It was just--”

“Yeah, I guessed that,” Clarke laughs. “I was just--” Clarke gestures between them, to indicate an attempt at a joke, something to break the ice, but Lexa has already done it all by herself.

“I’m Lexa. Do you want to sit? Shall we sit?” She points out to the table and goes around the blonde to sort of indicate where to go when Clarke laughs and says in a quick banter. “It’s either that or stand, oh you’re the one too.” She kind of finishes lamely and Lexa chuckles.  

Clarke then proceeds to get into the booth before Lexa hears her own voice once more. “Oh, I was sitting on that side--”

Clarke stops and stares at her, halting her motions with her eyebrows furrowed. “Oh, do I…?” Clarke starts to say, turning in confusion.

“No! No, it doesn’t matter! Why did I bring it up?” Lexa chuckles and shakes her head, and Clarke laughs along softly.

Once seated, Lexa can finally see her and take in the fact that Clarke is…lovely and intriguing and so beautiful, and Lexa is so, so beyond nervous.

The fork incident wasn’t even half of it.

Lexa sits back in the booth and exhales a shaky breath that turns into a giggle, trying to hide behind a wide smile. Lexa can already tell Clarke is quick at pair with her banter (once she starts doing the same), but still there’s a hidden softness to her that could understand whatever she’s going through.

“Sorry! I’m still pretty nervous,” Lexa explains sheepishly, drops her arm over the side of the booth in an attempt to seem relaxed. “This is my first time, you know, with the system,” Lexa points at the AI in her hand and places it down on the table.

“Me too,” Clarke adds quickly. She looks relieved, which makes Lexa feel relieved and better knowing that she’s not the only one who must be nervous. Even though Clarke seems fine, at least being it her first time as well could make her nervous, right? 

“Oh really?” Her face and her tone show it.

“Yeah, I’m freaking the fuck out,” Clarke concedes with an honest smile.

“Come to mention it, you look terrified,” Lexa jokes. Of course, she’s not.

Clarke looks the complete opposite of terrified. But once again it helps her to get her confidence back and actually show that she’s not completely inept at this.

This being: having a casual, witty and enjoyable banter. 

“Do I?” Clarke raises a pointed eyebrow, and looks intrigued.

“Yeah, your fear is palpable.”

“Or maybe I’m shaking with revulsion?” Clarke refutes.

“I don’t bite, unless you want me to. I mean if that’s what you fear is.” Lexa says before she can think, and Clarke laughs at that.  They both stare at each other with cheeky smiles. “Should we stop talking about kinky things?”

“Yeah, maybe order some food?” Clarke bites her lip before glancing at the table. “Do you know how we order?”

“I think we use these?” Lexa picks up her device and stares at it, hoping it has the answer when her coach speaks.

_Menu choices already established._

Before Lexa can think to talk again, a waiter appears and places food in front of them with their appointed meal.

“Well, I’m a pasta girl,” Clarke says, staring down at her plate, her lips twisted in a wry smile. Lexa is more preoccupied with the concoction in front of her to pay too much attention.

“Yeah I’m a--” Lexa peers down at it, and it looks like something she actually would order. “Fishcake kind of girl.”

Clarke chuckles, and Lexa smiles, and they both dig in.

If Clarke’s appreciative noises are real or fake, it makes Lexa stare down at her and smile nonetheless while trying something. “Can I try some?” Lexa points at Clarke’s plate.

“Are we allowed to do that?” Clarke cuts into her thoughts. She frowns, looking around the restaurant, so Lexa follows her gaze, turning to see what everyone else is doing. She catches the eye of a guard standing at the entrance, but he doesn’t seem too preoccupied watching them.

She turns back with a grin in time for Clarke to respond. “Screw it.”

“Yeah, screw it!” Lexa agrees, leaning forward in time for Clarke’s forkful of pasta to go into her mouth. Lexa chews thoughtfully, until she turns back to see the same guard who is actually eyeing them now with interest and a reproachful look.

Lexa decides to ignore it and instead tunes back in, just in time to hear Clarke’s question.

“So, we’re both first-timers.”

Lexa hums in agreement.

“Should we check our expiry date?” The way she asks it’s more like curiosity rather than her wanting to find out and get it over with. At least that’s what Lexa expects it to be, because she was thinking the same thing. “Yeah, good plan.”

“Yeah? All right, um so I think it’s under info” Clarke explains it while they both pick up their devices.

“Yes, uh, tap to reveal. We have to tap to reveal at the same time.” Lexa finds the ‘tap to reveal’ option and nods to let Clarke know she’s find it.

“Ok, so on three, two, one. GO!” They both tap it at the same time and instantly the time it’s revealed.

It shows the estimated time is 12 hours.

“12 hours?” Clarke asks, her voice showing her surprise.

“Yeah, 12 hours,” Lexa repeats, looking at her AI with a frown. Lexa thinks it’s short. She thought she had more time, they would have more time since it’s their first match, but it’s not.  

“Ok,” Clarke says dejectedly.

“It’s a bit, I don’t know…”

“Yeah.”

“It’s short, right?”

And suddenly the numbers on their AI begin counting down.

“Oh, and getting shorter. I didn’t realize it would sort of countdown like. That’s sort of sad.”

Lexa shakes her head in agreement but certain determination shows in her face. To make it count even if Clarke wasn’t the one for her, she was going to enjoy the short time they have. She puts her AI back on the table. “Maybe we should eat quickly?” Lexa suggests, and she smiles with a sort of playfulness behind her eyes.

The idea seems to be a good one and resonates with Clarke because it cheers her up.

“Yeah, maybe we should.” Clarke agrees, slowly putting her device down to instead pick up her fork and watching for Lexa’s obvious giddiness as she picks up promptly her silverware and takes a big bite of her food. “The race is on.”

“Come on, hurry up!” Lexa grins, shoving another bite into her mouth. Clarke takes a similar bite, but she’s busy trying not to laugh out loud and instead giggles.

* * *

They wait outside for their shuttle, when Clarke shivers like an immediate response to the being out in the cold even if it isn’t cold and it’s pretty warm, Lexa immediately takes off her jacket and puts it on her shoulders, gaining a blush from the blonde. It’s such a contrast from what it’s been the whole night, meaning Clarke carrying out the confidence and now she’s the one taking a leap of confidence.

“I guess this is us.” There’s a white automatic rickshaw that pulls just besides them and it opens up automatically without prompting manual labor.

“And this takes us to the place?”

“I guess.” The rickshaw should take them to where the dating program arranges for the couples to go to their own home stay arrangement for the rest of their time together.

“After you,” Lexa gestures with a grin and Clarke gives her a thankful smile as she gets in. “Thank you,” Clarke replies, taking her seat.

It’s nerve wracking and it’s a hazardous compromise to have the sort of expectations once they get on it but since she only has a couple of hours to spend with Clarke, Lexa finds herself excited to get there and to see how the night will play out.

They sit next to each other in silence, even if it the cabin is spacious they can’t help but be pressed against each other.

There’s a lull in the conversation but they can’t help it when they soak up the scenery and they don’t care much for idle conversation. “It’s massive.” Lexa says when they look to the building dome they were just in and the outside of it and the giant wall that covers just one side of the whole space they’re in.

They enjoy the silence because it’s mostly a comfortable silence. But Lexa is very aware of how soft thighs bump into hers softly, how her arms jostle and brush against hers but every time they do, there’s her own jolt inside of her that makes her feel…alive.

It doesn’t feel like it’s been long, in fact it was too short of a ride when they pull into their own house for the remaining 11 hours.

Lexa knows the system was wrong because how could they only have 12 hours? It’s not fair but she pushes the frustrating thought from her mind because she can’t let it ruin the rest of their night.

* * *

They stand just outside of the house. “Here we are!” Lexa announces.

“Yeah.” Clarke replies even if it wasn’t a question.

There’s a biometric lock for their handprint to open the door. “Do you want to open it?” Lexa asks, always thinking of Clarke first.

“Go ahead,” Clarke nods in her direction, and Lexa smiles at her.

“All right.” Lexa takes a step and it’s close enough to Clarke and closer to the lock when Clarke’s hand swats at her own and presses onto the biometric lock. “Too slow!”

Lexa rolls her eyes at her naturally but with mirth and laughs along with her. “You’re ridiculous.”

“Says the fork.” Clarke responds, her hand pressed to her chest in mock offense.

“And funny.”

“I know.”

They stare at each other in silence, regarding each other under the soft glow of the floodlight, and it starts to feel too serious for them because they don’t know how to take the next step. Fortunately, for them Lexa does. She opens the door ajar and peaks her head inside.

The house is gorgeous, as she looks around the interior, and is not so blown away by the modern décor but impressed by it. “Oh no, it’s a nightmare,” She laments, holding the door so that it remains hidden from Clarke’s line of vision, hoping she falls for her joke.

“You’re kidding?” Clarke complains.

Lexa smirks satisfied with herself when Clarke falls for it.

“Yeah, I am,” Lexa admits, and Clarke gives her a sarcastic smile.

Lexa opens the door fully and they both enter the apartment. The room immediately is overflowed with soft light, it has two yellow couches and a roaring fireplace in the center. It’s warm thanks to the fireplace but it’s also warm because it’s cozy, and it feels like a home.

Lexa already hates that she has to leave it so soon when she just thought of it as home. The thought scares her because it’s not only the house itself that feels like it but the blonde who admires the same  way as her their next living quarters for a short time.

“It’s nice,” Clarke says softly, looking around. “I like that lamp.” She points to a very plain looking lamp sitting on a table in the corner that matches the color of the couches.

“Yeah, it’s really incredible, that lamp,” Lexa chuckles, her tone is full of sarcasm.

“Fuck off,” Clarke smiles through her rolled eyes, and Lexa just watches her, no longer paying attention to any pieces of furniture or so-called incredible lamps. Suddenly, she feels so shy and suddenly she feels like the room doesn’t compare or doesn’t need that much attention when she has Clarke in front of her.

Clarke continues walking without her to the other room and she follows her until she stumbles upon the bedroom where a queen size bed is placed conventionally in the middle of the room. It seems daunting but also presumptuous for her to think of that bed, her and Clarke in it.

They both turn to stare at it for a few moments, the silence charged with unspoken questions. “Alright, that’s uh…” Lexa mumbles, and Clarke giggles uncomfortable.

Clarke continues walking towards the right side of the bed and opens the door in the corner. “There’s an ensuite,” Clarke says, breaking the silence.

“So is it a shower or a bath?” Lexa asks, she doesn’t know why but she asks.

“Both?” Clarke smirks.

“Oh, that’s good.” Lexa says lamely.

“Uh. Well, I’m just gonna use the bathroom,” Clarke gestures behind her, and Lexa nods, immediately shifting to head in the opposite direction. “Yeah, I’ve got to uh…over here,” Lexa backs up as she turns and walks rapidly back to the living room.

Finally by herself, Lexa quickly pulls out the AI and chances a quick glance over her shoulder to make sure Clarke isn’t within earshot, and then whispers into the machine.

“So, are we meant to just have sex with each other?” She asks desperately.

_Participants are not required to take any specific action._

“Yeah, but I mean we can, right?” Lexa is desperate to know. Not that she wants to or doesn’t want to for that matter but it’s all so new and she has already caught up feelings or something that resembles to it and she doesn’t know what to do.  “I mean, people do if it’s just a short time?”

_If that’s your decision._

“So it’s up to us?”

_It’s up to you._

Well that didn’t help.

She’s screwed.

* * *

Lexa hears the bathroom open and immediately pulls her AI away and takes a seat in the yellow couch and pretends to act normal once Clarke comes into view.

“I could just sleep here.”

The loveseat is small and it’s not even comfortable to seat in but she will if that’s what will put them both at ease.

“Don’t be absurd. You’ll be scrunched up in a ball,” Clarke explains surveying the loveseat once more.

Lexa shakes her head and curls up on the couch, awkwardly tucking her long legs in close to her chin as she scoots backwards, trying to squeeze the entirety of her frame into the small space to show Clarke that she was going to be ok. She barely fits but it’s something.

“It’s not awful,” she says, completely unconvincingly.

“The bed’s pretty big, I’m sure we can both fit in it,” Clarke says. She wants to let her go off the lie, and Lexa sounds all too eager to jump off the loveseat and agree that makes Clarke laugh at her eagerness.

* * *

They get into bed after initially a sort of ‘which side is your side’ type of stare contest until they just settle as they are. They’re still fully clothed, both of them on their backs staring at the ceiling.

“Must have been wild before the system.” Clarke fills the silence with her comment.

“What do you mean?” Lexa asks, turning to face her slightly while Clarke does the same. The room is dark but Lexa can still see Clarke on the little light that filters through parts of the curtain window.

“Well, people had to do the whole relationship thing themselves to work out who they wanna be with.”

“Hmm. Option paralysis. So many choices, you end up not knowing which one you want.”

“Yeah, exactly, and if things seem awful, they’d have to figure out whether they wanted to break up with someone.”

“How to break up with someone? Fuck that’s hard.” Lexa agrees. Just thinking about breaking up with Clarke seems impossible and she doesn’t have to do that.

“It’s a nightmare.”

“It’s not like when it’s all mapped out.” For that she’s confident in the system and the greater good, even if she still doesn’t like the time they have left.

“God, no. It’s so much simpler when it’s all mapped out!”

The conversation ends, and silence falls upon them. Maybe it was too much for that night. The conversation Lexa thinks, not the way that their hands brush and touch against each other every time someone talks, no, not that.

Clarke let’s out a undefeated sigh. “This is weird, though.”

“It really is,” Lexa she says it with a laugh.

When Clarke’s hand grazes along the top of her own hand, she turns her hand to be almost closer to Clarke’s. Clarke slides her hand into hers, and she immediately lets her fingers clasp around her own.

Lexa smiles in the darkness not fully aware that Clarke does too and then she tries to sleep but it never comes and then Clarke is talking about nothing and everything and she finally feels like it’s going to be ok.

* * *

They step out of the house and into the morning fresh air with the sun shining at its top. Their time almost running out, ending whatever they had. And they had something, at least Lexa thinks so.

The rest of their night was kind of a whirlwind, they talked, laughed, cried from laughter, and shared more than they would ever thought they could’ve in a short amount of time but the morning follow up with some sense of dread for their goodbyes.

There are two rickshaws already waiting for them, they’re in opposite directions and it makes Lexa’s stomach coil at the thought of saying goodbye.

“Well then,” Clarke says as they emerge from the apartment.

“So...” Lexa doesn’t know what to say to follow that because she doesn’t want to say anything other than ‘stay’.

“Thanks for being my first,” Clarke winks and squeezes her arm appreciatively. Lexa feels warm at the touch.

“Oh yeah absolutely, thank you for being mine.” The gratitude falls flat when it has a double meaning and because she wasn’t really hers.

Just then there’s the annoying sound of a ticking clock and she pulls out her AI that beeps even louder as the time comes to an end.

“Fuck this!” Clarke curses and it brings a smile to her face knowing that she at least was angry at it.

“It was great, you know. You were nice.” Lexa in the end says, not knowing how to encompass what she truly thinks of her and what they had. Even though they had a short time, it was more meaningful that she could ever dream of.

“So were you,” Clarke dips her head and her eyelashes flutter like she wants to say something else and before she knows it, Clarke is talking again with her hand clasped in hers. “If we had this time again, you would totally get it, by the way…” Clarke steps away with a sinful smirk on her face but her hand remains.

“You’d get it, too you know,” She finally responds when her voice returns.

“We fucked that one up, didn’t we?” Clarke pouts and Lexa’s chest feels like constricts around her heart and squeezes so hard that she’s afraid that she might die right then and there without another chance.

Another chance.

What she’d give for just another one.

“Yeah, totally.” Despite her pained smile, she wants to look at this as a happy memory instead of a lost one.

The time finally ticks down to zero, and Lexa realizes their fingers are still firmly interlocked. They keep their hands held and arms outstretched until the last possible second.

They finally part, and Lexa walks away in a complete daze. She looks back one more time just as Clarke does and gives her an encouraging smile. She nods to herself and enters her car perplexed at how hollow she feels and how the AI could possibly have someone more suitable for her.

* * *

“How do I know she wasn’t the perfect match for me?” Lexa asks as she runs through a hill just a few hours later. Her legs and lungs are burning up for the pent up energy and frustration that she put them through for the last couple of hours. At least they work, not like the AI who doesn’t provide her with the so much needed answers.

She can’t stop thinking about Clarke. She can’t stop thinking about how much their meeting as short as it was, was so overwhelming in a good way, in a way that Lexa was definitely not expecting it to be.

Like how she still remembers the way she laughed, the way her blue eyes twinkle with amusement when she talked about what was passionate to her, or how when she was teasing her. Or how comfortable she felt in a situation that with another complete stranger would feel like so weird. How little time they had and how they would never cross paths again.

_Your ultimate compatible other has not yet been selected._

“Yeah, I know, but it’s-”

_The system gains insight as each participant progresses through numerous relationships and uses the gathered data to eventually select an ultimate compatible other._

“On your pairing day I know, and it always finds your perfect match.” Lexa’s answer feels so robotic that she honestly feels like she’s one. A robot that quotes something so monotonous and simple, but deep down knows it’s true.

The system works.

_In 99.8% of cases._

_“_ But I have to go through a lot of relationships to find it?” She’s not looking forward to that.

_That is correct._

“Great.” Lexa sighs and puts it away on her pocket. The AI dings, indicating a new alert immediately after that. Lexa takes out the device from her hoodie pocket and swipes across to see what it was. “What’s this, another one?”

_That is correct._

“I’d best go get changed, then.” She pairs it with a defeat sigh. Hoping her mood changes by the time she gets to the restaurant, after all she wants to give this another chance.

* * *

Lexa surveys the restaurant and sees a girl that matches the image on the AI. She feels significantly less nervous than the last time and more hopeful since she hopes she’s paired up with another wonderful woman. But nothing or no one would compare to Clarke.

And great now she’s already comparing this to Clarke.

The woman is stunning albeit a little bit cold and detached and has an ongoing glare and an air of superiority that Lexa doesn’t think she would like so much if they ended up having a long relationship.

“Hi, I’m Lexa.”

“Hmm. I’m Echo and I’ve been here for a while.” 

“Sorry, I was getting changed.” Lexa apologizes and the woman regards her clothing with an unimpressed flair.

“Really?”

“You started already?” She points out to the almost empty plate.

“I was hungry.”

“Yeah, of course. Sorry.” She takes a seat and lets out a nervous chuckle. It seems her nerves have come back again, but it’s different.

“Come on, let’s get it over with. Checking the expiry.” Echo hasn’t even let her settle down fully before she says it abruptly, pulling the AI out of her purse. She looks so done with everything like she’s ready to end it before they even started.

“Oh! Yeah, of course.” She pulls hers out and they tap on their individual screens in an unsynchronized manner.

“One year.” Echo says surprised, the first time she really showed some emotion and it’s a bad one from her tone.

1 year.

Lexa gulps.

“We’ve got each other for one year? Could be a mistake” Echo says, and it doesn’t reassure Lexa when Echo asks her own coach if it is a mistake.

_This is not a mistake._

“Fuck!” Her thoughts exactly. Echo immediately manages to at least look a little bit sorry for her outburst and Lexa will take whatever she can. “There’ll be a reason.” She tries to offer comfort, more for herself than for her but Echo looks so bewildered at her train of thought that she doesn’t comment on it.

Just then a waiter comes and puts her fishcake on the table and she grins at the expected part of the night. At least she’s looking forward to something.

“Look on the bright side, there’s fishcake!”

“What?” She asks, shooting her a completely uninterested look. She’s not even trying. Lexa points to her plate but her smile falters as she looks more confused than ever.  “Fishcake, it’s a joke.”

“Right. So you’re the sort of person that makes jokes.”

* * *

There’s finally something they can agree on as Lexa finally emerges from beneath the sheets. They had incredible sex chemistry, but that was just about it.

Lexa lands on her side of the bed and stares at the ceiling while Echo is finally breathing normally again, and on the verge of completely passing out.

But the silence is a relief, because it brings her peace and a lot of time to consider that this will not end up great. Echo is condescending, uptight and rude, and if the only thing that can salvage this relationship is the sex then, she cannot possibly look forward to it.

She turns over and picks up her AI, she taps it once and the _‘364 days’_ reflects on darkness endlessly mocking her.

* * *

“So I can’t just walk away?” Lexa yells at her AI a month later, hitting up the punching bag since it’s the only thing that can make her let out all of her frustrations away.

_That is correct. One day it will provide you with the ultimate match._

Lexa hits the bag angrily, hurting her hands in the process.

“One day!” She scoffs, panting now from her exertion, and all her stress at this impossible situation. “One day.” She repeats hoping that one day meant tomorrow or soon.

* * *

She’s got -well they got- an invitation to celebrate a couple’s pairing day. It’s just a show to show everyone that the system really does work. For Lexa is just an excuse to leave the house, change routines and possibly find her if she’s there. 

Lexa is so happy to have a break from having to endure Echo and her nagging, Echo and her impossible attitude and stuck-up airiness, Echo and her insatiable appetite for sex and only sex since they’re only good at that.

They arrive at the venue which is held outdoors on a nearby park, with a pond and string lights all over the patio, creating a fairytale illusion that would look so much better in the night.

Lexa tries to hold Echo’s hand since everyone is doing it but Echo is barely holding her hand in return.

They go deeper into the mingling masses and Echo let’s go of her hand quickly when she sees something she’s interested in and doesn’t ask for Lexa’s presence so she leaves her alone without further preamble. Lexa just refrains barely the roll of her eyes, not wanting to come as rude to other people that are watching and could possibly be her future matches.

She’s just standing over a table when she looks for Echo but in reality and if she’s true to herself she’s looking for Clarke. And what shall be asked, shall be received, or something like that.

She sees her standing near the brick archway, and just as she’s about to go, she notices that she’s not alone and she’s almost smiling.

Things happen for a reason she keeps the mantra and just sighs and looks for Echo instead, just in time as the sound of a glass tingling with taps on it, signaling a toast or just the required attention that it’s needed for something.

There’s the celebrated couple standing on a patch of grass and the crowd gathers around the happy couple.

Lexa is at the front with Echo just beside her but not really at her side.

She stares at the girl with short black hair, she’s smiling from ear to ear. Standing next to her is a boy with big googles on his head and a childish attitude. They look perfect together, meaning that they’re exactly who Lexa pictured them with.

So after all they are a picture of perfect soulmates.

“So I’d just like to say, have faith in the system, because it DOES deliver! It did for us!” Maya howls, and Jasper with a dopey smile nods vigorously. They grab each other’s hands and giggle together like they have a secret on their own, and maybe they do.

Lexa watches them in total bewilderment while Echo has a small smile on her face but it’s one nonetheless.

“You have so many experiences and then one day it pairs you up with your ultimate match! The

best in show as it were.” Maya keeps on adding while Jasper howls, literally does in happiness which makes Maya laugh and everyone in the yard does so as well.

“So if you’re having any doubts just hang on in there.” Maya asserts.

“Because it really does work.” Jasper exclaims.

Everyone around Lexa starts to clap, and by everyone it’s everyone as she glances to Echo who does it and Clarke who still is in her line of sight but hasn’t seen her yet or so she thinks and of course the bloke beside her, so everyone.

As the sun began to disappear and the not chilly night air came to loom, serves come and put together a spread of food for everyone. Lexa doesn’t know what else to do since the conversations were dull and Echo had already sorted back to the resting bitch face that pushed away everyone who wanted to start a conversation. So Lexa goes to eat something.

She’s got a chicken tender and dips it into something.

“Garlic dip. Thanks for that.” Echo grits her teeth together and Lexa purposely grabs another one and dips it again, chewing forcefully until Echo rolls her eyes and goes away.  

She grins at her own stunt and that’s when she feels a tap on her shoulder. Lexa turns and her face lights up immediately when she sees Clarke.

“Hi!” Clarke says excited.

“Hmm.” Lexa wants to say hi but she has the fucking chicken strip on her mouth. “I-”

“Was that, uh, your…?” Clarke points at Echo’s retreating form, who stomps away and glares at Lexa and now Clarke.

Lexa nods, and points. “Yeah, Echo.” She says with her mouth almost full.

Clarke nods knowingly. “Oh, Echo. What a name.”

Lexa nods but then she’s coughing up a storm when she feels the fucking chicken stuck on her throat and she can’t breathe!

Why? Why does this have to happen to her?

If she could blame someone, and she will, she will blame Clarke and she does. She has thought of saying hello but she didn’t want to bother her and she thought that maybe Clarke would come to her but as the afternoon passed by and they were only a few hours or minutes away from leaving she decided she wasn’t going to talk to her. But she sneaked up on her, just as the first time and she’s looking even more beautiful than before.

So of course Lexa can’t function or just remember how to swallow.

“You ok?” Clarke laughs, shaking her head as if she doesn’t believe her antics. “No, you’re not being…” Clarke looks around as Lexa looks her panicked and still coughing. “Serious.”

“Oh my God. Ok, this is happening. Ok, um, just…” Clarke pats her on the back several times and Lexa finally coughs up the killer chicken and launches it crassly onto Clarke’s shoe.

“Oh. Thanks!” Lexa gratefully says, wiping her mouth and taking a deep breath. It’s so good to breathe.  

Despite her consistent blush, she manages to say something nice.  “You look well!”

“Thanks. I’d return the compliment, but you’ve just spat food all over my shoe, so…” Clarke looks down and Lexa does the same and she can’t help but laugh.

“To be fair, it is a revolting shoe so,” Lexa defends herself with a laugh and Clarke acts offended for a while.

“Then all the better to kick you with!” Clarke exclaims, and she does. She literally kicks Lexa in the shin in a jest, but Lexa stares at Clarke in shock because one it freaking hurt and second because she didn’t think she would do it, and third she has felt more this couple of minutes with Clarke than she has with Echo for all the moments they’ve had together.

“Was that really hard?”

“Ouch?” Lexa’s eyebrows furrow in confusion as she smiles wider.

“I’m so sorry, fuck!” Clarke grabs Lexa's arm, completely horrified that she just did that and it actually hurt her but Lexa’s laugh is contagious and she’s laughing with her.

It doesn’t matter that everyone looks at them funnily as they keep on laughing because it’s perfect and just like them and she doesn’t want it to end.

But end, it does. They’re interrupted by a tall, floppy haired man who comes to Clarke’s side, sliding his arm around her shoulder and preening at Lexa. He smirks at her and she instantly hates him as she sees him look her up and down in a way that he shouldn’t be doing not while he has Clarke the most beautiful woman at his side. 

“Oh! Oh, hm…uh…” Clarke stumbles through it, almost as she forgot his name.

“Finn, this is Lexa. Lexa, this is Finn.”

“Hello Finn.” Lexa greets him coldly while he takes her hand and tries to kiss it before Lexa pulls away instantly.

“We were together for a bit.” Clarke explains to Finn, before looking back at her. “A small bit.” She supplies, because it seemed like she was telling their private joke. 

“Yeah, just before we…” Clarke gestures to her and Finn and offers Lexa an apologetic smile.

“So you two? Oh. That’s…great. So I mean, it looks like you two make a great team.” Lexa says team instead of couple because she doesn’t; want to look at them that way and all through that she manages to fake a smile.

Just then Echo appears right at her side and offers the other couple a simple nod. She looks between Lexa and Clarke and the secret glances they’ve been giving each other and grabs Lexa’s hand.

“They’re about to leave.” Echo only offers, and that’s when the happily matched couple run to their rickshaw and the guests at the party begin clapping at their departure.

“I’ll see you.” Clarke waves goodbye, but her eyes stay on Lexa’s even as she’s walking away. Clarke seems sad but Lexa thinks that maybe she’s just projecting her own feelings.  Still, she nods quickly as a goodbye. “Yeah, bye.”

* * *

It’s a constant routine for Lexa.

Wake up, take a shower (not a bath), make breakfast, go to the gym, return all sweaty to take another shower, eat lunch, go running, return all sweaty for Echo to ravage her, take another shower and then sleep.

The time passes so slowly, that Lexa thinks it will never end but end it does. So 365 agonizing days later, Lexa finds herself standing outside the house (not home), as far away from Echo as she can get, watching the seconds tick down on her AI.

“It was-“ She tries to salvage something but Echo just looks at her with a bewildered expression because after all she knows that Echo doesn’t care about anything.

“Yeah, it was.” Echo simply says and she leaves while she does the same.

* * *

“Well, I learned what it’s like to survive cohabiting with someone I didn’t get along with. Is that useful for the system?” Lexa asks her AI later, sitting on a hill after her run to the top. She’s tired and sad and truth to be told emotionally as well as physically drained.  

_Everything happens for a reason._

Lexa scoffs, she used to think that way but now is like she was drained of hope and can’t help but question the system that took one year out of her life.

A ping sounds and she has forgotten the sound for another relationship but as the notification goes off she knows it’s another one.

“That’s sooner than I expected.”

It doesn’t matter; she just hopes it goes well this time.

* * *

She’s not nervous.

She’s not anxious.

She’s just…calm and collected.

She’s just defeated.

She hears the click of familiar heels and looks up and it’s like the wind has knocked her off air. Walking towards her is Clarke. “Hello, you.”

“Hi!” Lexa stands immediately and opens her arms for a hug. Clarke falls into her and wraps her own arms tightly around her. A perfect fit again.

“Is this right?” Lexa says after detaching herself from the comfort of Clarke’s arms.

“Yeah.”

“I mean-“

“Yeah, I didn’t think the system would hook us up again,” Clarke equals her thoughts as she sits down.

“No me either,” Lexa agrees as she sits down. “I mean, I hope it’s right, obviously but-”

While Clarke taps her AI, she wills her heart to stop beating so loudly.

“Coach, is this the right table?”

_Yes, that is correct._

Her heart beats even faster to the thought of a second chance and she can’t help but smile from ear to ear.  “Ok, well…” Lexa reaches for her AI and Clarke holds out her hand to stop her.

“Wait, umm. Can we not check the expiry date?”

“Uh. Why?” She asks, even though she doesn’t want to know either but it was sort of the norm right?

“I’m sick of it,” Clarke says with an air of defeat, so Lexa puts hers away. “The system’s just bounced me from short fling after short flings. I know they’re short flings, they’re just meaningless, and I get really detached. It’s like I’m not really there.”

Lexa nods because she’s been there, done that.

“So the other week, I was with this guy. God knows who, basically just a haircut. And I literally had this out-of-body experience. I wandered out of my body, and I sat in this chair across the room and I watched myself fucking this guy. And I was, like, what is that all about?”

“Yeah, that’s pretty detached,” Lexa agrees awkwardly, not wanting to imagine Clarke with other people but at the same time doing it so, so that Clarke knows it will be different with her.

“But when it’s a long term things, it’s just as bad, you know. It’s like watching the clock like you’re a prisoner, counting the hours, the minutes.”

“Oh God, I’ve been there.” Clarke nods sympathetically.

“I was basically just surviving.”

“Life should be more than just surviving, don’t we deserve that?” Clarke asks, and it resonates through her that she says fuck it. “Yeah, let’s not check the expiry, then.”

“Yeah,” Clarke says excited. “It’s a deal.” Clarke holds out her hand, and Lexa smiles as she takes it in her own. “Deal.”

“Let’s bring chicken fingers.” Lexa jokes and Clarke laughs loudly.

* * *

Lexa’s is sort of in a trance the whole way to the assigned house. While they spent talking about their recent and failed relationships at dinner, they haven’t touched their impending one, not wanting to break the spell that has certainly descended upon them.  They’re still blissful in their ignorance at the ticking time clock.

They’re standing in the darkness of bedroom neither one bothering to turn on a light, keeping just the natural light guides them through. They stand face to face, and the more silence reigns over them, the more nervous and giddy Lexa feels.

It’s Clarke and that means that every moment means something. It has always meant something.

“So?”

“So.”

“Might as well,” Clarke says casually, looking at the bed. She raises an eyebrow in jest and looks at Lexa with a pointed lip bite.

“I suppose we have to. I don’t know how much time we’ve got.” Lexa says and they’re both remained of their time so they have to quick up the pace they were dancing around each other.

“Yeah, it could be ten minutes. Think you could last ten minutes?” Clarke jokes, and Lexa rolls her eyes at her. “Fuck you.”

“Oh, you’re about to.” Clarke raises both of her eyebrows and wiggles them as a joke but the way her voice turns heavier or well her breathing Lexa thinks she’s really about to.

“All right. Ok, then. Wait, One of us should get undressed first,” Clarke suggests, putting some distance from Lexa.

“Why only one of us?” Lexa asks, narrowing her eyes, not quite catching up what Clarke is hinting at.

“It’ll be funny.” That’s the only explanation she gives her.

“Go on then. Undress for me.” Lexa gestures at her with a smirk.

She stares at the curves of her body, and the way her dress is hugging her hips, and she swallows thickly. It’s all fun and games until that fabric comes off.

“No, no. It was my idea.” Clarke looks at her smugly and pushes the lapels of her jacket to prove her point.

They hold each other’s stare for a few seconds, neither one wanting to give in, until Lexa finally caves. “All right.” Lexa turns her back to her and begins to take off her jacket and then unbutton her shirt.

“This is kind of weird!” Lexa stops to complain, her fingers clumsily trying to work the buttons on her shirt, while she can feel Clarke’s eyes intensely staring at her. It reminds her of the way Echo would look at her with hunger when she saw her abs and body in general just as a piece of meat, and she felt conscious then and she’s conscious now. But she knows that Clarke doesn’t only look at her like that, it’s deeper, or at least she hopes.

“You will make up for it in a minute,” Clarke’s voice is low and throaty and it makes Lexa’s fingers tremble on one of the buttons and finally takes her shirt off.

“Why am I the only one who gets-“ Lexa begins to say, before full lips are pressed against her own. Hands wander all over her hair and she immediately grabs Clarke by the waist.

Clarke has her cornered against the table and kissing her forcefully with everything she has.

That’s when it finally registers that she’s kissing Clarke and she relents all train of thought and focuses on how delectable her lips are, the curves and her soft skin that warms up to her own touches. Her body fits around Lexa’s, her body is a wonderland. She’s all curves and silk where Lexa is definition and steel.

Her mouth finds her body so soft, so perfect, so hers that it’s finally a couple of hours later that she physically can’t continue anymore. Her only thought after that is how her whole body molds itself to be the little spoon to Clarke’s big spoon and how their fingers intertwined finally have their place.

* * *

When Lexa wakes, is to Clarke small kisses on her neck, since a couple of hours ago they’ve moved and now Clarke is curled into her side, her arm draped over her stomach, her lips pressed to her neck and Lexa’s fingers and arm around her that she can feel again the softness under her fingertips.

She really can’t think of a time that she’s ever been happier, she kisses Clarke’s forehead gently for it, for her happiness.

Clarke looks up and has a question ready for her but she kisses her before she can and they spent more hours wrapped up in each other.

* * *

A couple of days pass and it feels like a dream every waking moment that she spends it with Clarke. There’s no routine because everything Clarke does it’s the opposite of that, because everything Lexa does is to get out of it, but she wouldn’t mind to get on with routine if Clarke is by her side.

They are taking a stroll around a park, when Clarke bounces up in her step as she talks about something she has been keeping to herself, Lexa knows.

“What if there is no scrutiny? It’s just putting us together in any old order, and we all go along with it, cause they’re always telling us how clever it is?”

“Yeah, but it does put people with the one,” Lexa says, allowing Clarke to pull her forward while her hands are still connected, up the stairs of the gazebo in the park. “It’s got a 99.8% success rate.”

“But how do you know they’re perfect matches? I mean, what if all it’s actually doing is gradually wearing us down, putting us in one relationship after another for random durations in a random sequence? Each time you get a little bit more pliable, a little bit more broken, until eventually it coughs up the final offering and says that’s the one.”

Lexa keeps her mouth shut, knowing that Clarke wanted to get it out of her chest.

“And by that point you are so defeated and so exhausted that you just accept it, you settle!” Clarke puts her arms around her neck and pulls her close while Lexa does the same around her middle. “And then you have to live the rest of your life convincing yourself you didn’t.”

“Well done. That goes my idea of the one.”

“I mean it.”

“Do you want to hear my theory?” Clarke nods as she takes a step backwards, putting some distance between them.

“Let’s assume the system isn’t random, it’s a sophisticated as they say it is,” Lexa begins to explain as she reaches for her AI. “Right, so using these, it consumes up all your reactions yeah? It builds up a complex profile. Every crazy thought you’ve ever had, all your dreams and your weaknesses and -”

“And your mad theories.”

“Yeah, like, everything in your head.”

“OK.”

“So if it’s everything in your head, does it have thoughts?”

“All right, so now you’re going to say, what if that’s us and we’re stuck in a simulation?” Clarke jokes as she pushes Lexa with her hands until Lexa is against a wall.

“Well, how would we know?” Lexa asks, even though she just spit up a wild idea, deep down she thinks it’s true. Clarke stares at her. It’s far-fetched and improbable, and Clarke quickly pinches her ribs causing her to yelp in surprise. “Ow!” Lexa laughs, swatting Clarke away.

“I think that settles it,” Clarke grins, turning to continue walking.

“I might have been programmed to go ‘ow’.” Lexa yells after her, holding her arms out.

“Ok! Clarke says, fluttering her hand dismissively. She turns away fully and starts walking, leaving her to chase after her. She takes a couple of seconds to massage her injured side before Clarke returns quickly and jumps into her arms, with her legs around her waist. She’s kissing her and laughing and Lexa spins them around, forgetting how serious the conversation turned out to be if they just really listened.

* * *

It’s plain and simple connection. While Clarke pretends to sleep, her head on her legs facing upwards, Lexa is watching her contently and raking her fingers through wild blonde hair. Clarke giggles to herself and Lexa smiles when she opens up her eyes and watches her looking at her.

The connection is there even if they aren’t necessarily talking or doing something, they’re just simply being, them. They living and not surviving.  

Lexa likes the reminder that she’s real, but what she cannot forget is the impending doom of the hours, of how the Ai hasn’t stablished that they’re a compatible match, so they have an established time together, and she’s afraid that it could end in hours, minutes, seconds.

Clarke gets up and goes to the kitchen while she stays on the couch. She pulls her AI for a moment, debating or not to read it before she discards it when Clarke comes back with something on her hands and smiles at her.

* * *

They’re both in the bathtub. She finally can take a bath, and what better bath than have Clarke covered in bubbles, Clarke laughing as she scoops a handful of soap and places it on her head in order to form a crown.

Lexa leans forward to grab some of her own, and her head knocks into Clarke’s nose, and they fall into soapy laughter at their awkward movements that aren’t awkward at all but simply theirs.

It’s simple, magical and it’s plain connection all at the same time.

Clarke pulls her into a kiss.

Lexa pulls her into her lap.

And it’s all so perfect that it has to end sometime, right?

* * *

Lexa feels the AI is mocking her, enticing her to make a rash decision. But she’s nowhere near rash and nowhere near ready to loose Clarke so soon if the expiry date happens to be soon without them knowing it. No matter how badly they want to ignore it, there’s the omniscient expiration date. They aren’t meant to the one’s to each other and the longer they prolong the inevitable, the harder it gets for Lexa to play along. So no matter what she has to know.

She has to know because she’s in too deep, now. She’s invested, and she cares and she lov-

She’s in love with Clarke and oh no.

The AI no matter how hard she tries to avoid it, lays on her bedside table and Lexa jolts up in bed at the realization, she wills her heart to stop pounding so loud, afraid that it would wake up Clarke but when she glances over Clarke’s breaths are calm and even and she’s deeply asleep.

Lexa quietly slides out of bed and grabs the AI to take with her. She paces around the apartment before she taps into the AI and waits for it to come alive since it’s been a while she has touched it.

She feels like she’s going to throw up. Because they promised each other, they shook on it. Is she going to really do this? Before she can decided that it was a bad idea the AI turns on and the light illuminates the living room brightly.

“Coach?” Lexa whispers softly into the AI.

_Hello Lexa._

She looks back to where Clarke’s supposed to be sleeping and she is. 

“I’ve gotta know,” Lexa says, keeping her voice low, hoping the machine doesn’t ask her what but it does.

_What would you like to know?_

“The expiry date for me and Clarke. I need to know how long.”

There’s no response from the AI.

“You’re not going to talk me out of it?” She scoffs.

_Would you like me to talk you out of it?_

“Yeah. Uh. No. No, I don’t know.”

The AI shows an option that says: Tap to reveal.

She just needs to put her fingerprint for her confirmation.

“No, I’m not going to do it. I said I wouldn’t.” Lexa places the AI on the breakfast table, away from her. “We shook on it.”

No, she definitely shouldn’t do this. They said they wouldn’t. Again they shook on it.  

Lexa waits a few more minutes that seem like hours and she sighs dejectedly because she knows it’s wrong but still she needs to know.

“Fuck it.” She takes the AI from the table and taps the screen before she can stop herself.

_5 years._

Lexa nods to herself and has a somewhat relieved smile. It’s not what she wants it to be, five years is nothing but it’s good, it’s something, it’s-

The AI buzzes.

_Recalibrating._

_3 years ._

Lexa taps at the screen afraid, her heart pounding furiously. “Coach?” she asks, continuing to tap harder and harder each time, hoping that way it would erase the 3 years number. “Coach what’s happening? Coach, it’s getting shorter!”

_Recalibrating._

_18 months._

“Coach!” Lexa exclaims in horror, she runs with the AI and the annoying buzz and the recalibrating sound outside where she won’t disturb or alert the blissfully unaware woman on the bed.

_One-sided observation has destabilized the expiry date._

“What?”

_One-sided observation has destabilized the expiry date._

_Recalibrating._

“Because I looked at it on my own, it made it shorter?” Lexa asks in a panic.

_That is correct._

“Why!?” Lexa yells in frustration.

_Everything happens for a reason._

2 months.

“All right, well, undo it, then. Make it go back!” She implores.

_I cannot do that._

_Recalibrating._

“What if she looks at it?”

_Once shortened, the expiry date cannot be extended._

_3 weeks._

“Why?!”

_Everything happens for a reason._

“Come on. Come on!”

_Recalibrating._

_5 days_

“When will it stop?”

_It will stabilize once recalibration has completed._

_Recalibrating._

“Stop it. Stop it! Just-“ She panics, her grip tightens and the screen cracks but it continues with the sound of recalibration until it finally stops.

_20 hours._

It begins a countdown from 20 hours.

Lexa stares at the clock, numb and in shock.

She just ruined everything, she just ruined 5 years with the love of her life for what?

She’s going to lose Clarke for the second time.

She feels like she’s just been knocked out and she can’t breathe.

She throws the AI towards the grass but it magically appears on her side with the insistent sound of the clock counting backwards from 20. She breaks down and cries until her eyes are puffy, until the air finally feels cold and she’s freezing and somewhere inside the house Clarke calls her name.

* * *

Clarke comes right behind her, tickling her until she turns around and she can kiss her. Traces of her crying are long gone now, she hopes.

Clarke smiles into the kiss and she kisses her one more time because maybe it will be the last.

“You ok?” She asks, frowning when she fully registers her look.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” she says detached of emotion.  

“All right.” Clarke nods.

“I’m good.”

* * *

They’re in the park, at the lake where Clarke loves to throw stones.

And Lexa just watches.

Watches how every stone makes it into 4 skips.

“Have you ever had more than four or less than four?” Clarke asks her, as she stares out over the lake, not once looking back at her, as she were in a trance.

Lexa is checking the AI and the hours left instead.

When she doesn’t answer Clarke finally turns to her.

“What are you thinking about?” Clarke asks, and she just puts her hands in her pockets and shakes her head. “Nothing,”

She picks a stone of her own and tosses it; it bounces 4 times and sinks.

Clarke wraps her arms around her waist, and rests her head on her shoulder, Lexa just rests her hand over Clarke’s arm and rubs it up and down.

* * *

They are in the candle shaped building, heading to a bar.  

While Clarke is a couple of stairs ahead of her, Lexa falls back to check on the AI and the hour, for the nth time. She can’t help it.

She sighs and follows Clarke once the step out of the escalator.

“All right, seriously, what’s up?” Clarke asks, concern all over her face.

She says nothing, takes a couple of deep breaths and waits.

“I looked,” Lexa simply says.

“Looked at what?”

Lexa just keeps on staring at her, hoping that way she would understand what she’s saying. She proves that she knows her and her face changes completely so does her tone. “We promised we wouldn’t. We shook on it!”

“Don’t you wanna know what it said?” Lexa asks and Clarke is staring at her angrily and hurt.

“No. That was the point!”

“Well it’s almost done anyway.” Lexa practically grits her teeth and looks away. She doesn’t want to see into Clarke’s disappointed blue eyes.

“How almost done?” Clarke asks quickly.

“We’ve got like an hour.” Lexa looks up at her with regret before her eyes shift back to the floor.

“Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

“I didn’t want to spoil today.”

“And this hasn’t spoiled it.” The tears welling behind her blue eyes, crack Lexa.

“It was supposed to be five years, but now…” Lexa starts. “I looked at it, something happened, it started going down. I don’t know what it was.“

“So you broke it?” Clarke finally yells and pushes her chest while she says it.  

“No! No, no, no. I mean. I don’t…I don’t know!”

“Why did you have to look at it?”

“Look, I was thinking maybe we could overcome it somehow.” Lexa takes a step towards Clarke, pleading now for her to understand her reasoning.

“Why did you have to look at it?” Clarke repeats, her voice shaking.

“Because I love you.” Lexa blurts out. “I really, really love you,” she repeats, softer this time.

“For fuck’s sake. And that wasn’t enough?”

Wasn’t their love enough?

It was, but she feels like Clarke is evading it somehow. “That’s not the point. I looked, but that’s not the issue here.”

“Are you sure about that?” Clarke scoffs and Lexa fumes. “You’re more wound up about that than how short the time is!”

“Yes, because we had agreed.” Clarke says defeated, a tear rolling down her face. She pushes her again when she comes closer. “Listen, listen. What if we just ignore it?”

“We can’t.”

“Listen, we’ll just fuck the system. We’ll fuck it.”

“And do what?” Clarke argues.

“We’ll jump out, over the wall, get out.” Lexa explains desperately.

“There is nothing out there.”

“How would you know?” When Clarke glances back worriedly she does the same and there’s a couple of people staring at them and one guard is standing right behind them, eying them warily.

“Clarke-“

“You’ve ruined this.” Clarke pulls herself from Lexa’s grip and turns to walk away. “You’ve ruined it.”

The guard takes out a Taser gun and turns it on as Lexa says it’s nothing.

“Clarke.”

“Don’t follow me.”

“Clarke, I’m sorry.” Lexa cries out one last time. But she’s far away and everyone is silently watching her and judging her and-

She punches the wall.

* * *

_Everything happens for a reason._

“What reason?” Lexa screams to the AI in her hand. Now that she’s back at the house where no trace of Clarke is left. She doesn’t know how she got there, she only knows that her feet took her where she felt like home was, even if Clarke felt like home. Without Clarke, she feels numb, broken and defeated.

She honestly can’t remember the last time she felt this bad because she can’t remember nothing before this either.

What she does know, is that she ruined the best thing in her life, that she’s alone and she’s exhausted.

_The system will be assessing your reaction to the painful premature termination of a treasure relationship and will adjust and improve its profile of your eventual chosen one accordingly._

“You’re a great comfort.”

_Thank you._

She’s fully sobbing now. “I swear to God, I feel like scaling the wall out there and jumping in the fucking wilderness.

_That would contravene the rules of the system._

“Oh, the fucking system!”

_Failure to comply with the system may result in banishment._

She would prefer to be banished that to keep on suffering here, but then she wouldn’t have the chance to see her again.

“All right, I know! Fuck, will you let me be angry at least? Will you give me that?”

_You must vacate your current living quarters when the time expires._

“Like I didn’t know.” She finally throws the device against the window.

Neither shatters while her heart does.

* * *

After the time expires, Lexa just feels like a shell of a person.

She starts to survive again.

Each new relationship fails, they seem like a hassle and they think she’s just lost.

None of them are right, none of them are Clarke.

She doesn’t care.

Not about them or about really finding the one.

Until there’s  ping on her AI when she’s running and she stops when the sound that registers it’s different, but she doesn’t focus on that first but what comes after.

A farewell period.

A chance to say goodbye.

She doesn’t even care that she will have her ultimate match but just the thought that she can say sorry, one last moment to make it right.

One last chance.

* * *

Lexa sits at their usual table, and it feels like the first time and the second time, and feels like nothing has changed but it has.

She watches as Clarke runs in, looking stunning and desperate and slightly wild as she runs up to her. For a second, she thinks Clarke still might be angry, but she has barely have the time to stand up before Clarke’s arms are around her neck and her lips are on hers and she’s in Lexa’s arms.

They kiss, like it’s their last dying breath willing to share it with each other. They kiss like it’s their last and it tastes like a new start.

They reluctantly break apart, when Lexa picks up the AI and takes a seat while Clarke takes a seat right beside her. “Wait, wait. How long have we got?”

The Ai shows an hour. Lexa slams her hand on the table, the cutlery makes a riveting sound and Clarke jumps with it until she pulls Lexa again against her and kisses her again and again. Clarke whimpers into their kiss, Lexa feels everything she doesn’t say or what she thinks of the time left so she holds on to it for dear life.

“Look, the system’s set my pairing day for tomorrow.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“Right. I don’t want whoever the system reckons the one is, ok? I want you.”

“I want you.” Clarke replies at the same time, staring into Lexa’s eyes.

_Failure to comply with the system-_

“You can fuck off!” Lexa says, turning the AI over and ignoring it.

Clarke grins.

_May result in banishment._

“Can you remember where you were before you came here?” Clarke asks. That’s been a recurring question in her head.

Lexa stares at her, trying desperately to remember, but she can’t.

“You can’t, can you?”

“No?” Lexa shakes her head. No, all she can remember is Clarke.

“Me neither.”

“Why can’t I think of that?”

“It’s a test. Do you remember the first night that we were together? I mean the first night, how did you feel?”

“I felt safe, happy, comfortable.” Lexa smiles, as she thinks about seeing Clarke for the first time. “It felt right.”

Clarke nods because she feels the same.

“It felt like something locked into place, like we’d met before.”

“Like it had happened before and it’ll happen again, like it’s happened a thousand times over and over again. Do you know what I mean?” Clarke is almost in frenzy, her eyes wide and excited, like she’s trying to convey so much to Lexa.

“Yeah.” Lexa knows it because she feels it, too.

She chooses Clarke. She will always be with her Clarke.

Because she has done it before, and she will do it again.

“Yeah. Yeah, I do.” Lexa glances warily over her shoulder, looking around the restaurant.

“Ever since we met this world has been toying with us, trying to keep us apart. It’s a test, I swear it is and the two of us, rebelling against it together is something to do with passing it” Clarke wraps her hands around her neck.

“We’ve gotta fuck it all off.”

“Exactly. We’ve just gotta fuck the whole thing off and go. 

“Yeah, over the wall.”

“Right over it. No matter what’s out there.”

“Ok.”

“So let’s go.”

“Yeah, let’s go.” Lexa smiles, and she takes Clarke’s hand in hers pulling her to standing.

The time ticks down to zero weirdly enough as if rebelling had caused the device to recalibrate and give them just a couple of seconds. 

They both look around at the other patrons of the restaurant. Everyone is staring at them, like they’re some sort of spectacle but motionless.

They simply watch.

 Lexa takes Clarke by the hand and they begin to head for the exit. One of the guards begins to walk forward  menacingly, his taser out and pointed at them, ready to strike.

Lexa tries to position herself so Clarke is behind her, but Clarke just pulls her behind her as if she was going to protect her.

They just wanted to protect each other.

Clarke reaches forward and places her hand right on the electric current of the gun, but it does nothing. It only stops time and everyone around them.  

Everyone but her and Clarke.

And they make a run for it.

* * *

They head straight for the wall, passing everyone and everything that remained frozen.

When they finally reach the wall, which is huge and seems impossible to climb, a ladder appears and it leads to the top.

“Come on.” Clarke confidently says. They begin the long climb. The more they go up, the landscape starts to disappear and then all of the sudden it shifts. The grass, the buildings, the houses and the lights in the distance are all fading to black.

They’re suddenly at the top Lexa realizes and they’re in a black empty room, with shiny black and white dots on the floor and black walls that looks like the holding hub of a spacecraft. Clarke and Lexa walk through it, hand in hand, surprised to find that they are not the only couple to rebel.

Dozens of others are standing there looking around, holding each other, frantically wondering what comes next.

And that’s when they realize that the couples look just exactly like them.

It’s them.

And they remember each and every one of them.

Like the time they met in an apocalyptic world full of zombies.

When they were in space.

Or the time where they were the school rebels.

Or Clarke was a doctor and Lexa her patient.

Or Lexa was a lawyer and Clarke was her client.

When they met when they were older, way older.

When the sky met the earth. When she was Heda and Clarke was Wanheda. (That’s the only one that doesn’t have a number yet)

A number pops up over their heads 998, and Lexa looks around to see that there are numbers over each couple.

  1. 207\. 210. 214. 304. 306. 307. 500. 732. 892. 990.



Clarke is looking around just as bewildered until each variation of Lexa and Clarke begins to fade in front of them.

One by one they blur from focus and seem to get sucked up into the ceiling, adding to a total count that is projected on a big screen in front of them. The number rises of completed simulations until eventually they reach to 995 and they both get taken up into the sky, and their total simulation is numbered.

The big board counts up the totals and displays the results.

_1000 Simulations completed._

_998 Rebellions logged._

_99.8% Match._

* * *

Lexa is not used to new things, she has never been one to accept a trend and follow it but her friends do, or at least most of them do and this, this is just the exception.

She’s never used a dating app before, but Lincoln swears that it works and seeing Lincoln and Octavia so happy makes her willing to try.

She’s not used to it, yet. But it’s pretty easy to navigate through. Like any other site, it uses a true algorithm that takes into consideration your preferences and other secret factors that ultimately pairs you with your soulmate. Did I mention before that there’s a secret factor to all this? There is, Lexa wants to know what it is but the only thing she’s aware as to right now is that, she’s apparently 99.8% compatible with someone.

Someone out there is her soulmate and that excites her as well as terrifies her.

The bar is so loud, the music is acceptable and the drinks are passable as Lexa leans by the counter. Lincoln is telling her something about a dream he had while Octavia shares weirdly enough the same aspects as him to her own dream story.

She listens idly to the conversation but she’s more focused on her cell phone which shows the picture of the girl she’s matched with. She can’t help the smile it elicits from her as she regards the blonde, blue eyed woman on the screen and it shows how already smitten she is even if she hadn’t met her yet in person.

Her friends must’ve noticed her detached attention to their story and the dopey smile she’s wearing because Octavia is poking her in the arm, repeatedly.

“What?”

“I said, she’s here.”  Octavia points out to the back where the blonde woman is.

She’s staring down at her cell phone, and Lexa recognizes her instantly.

Clarke.

Above her name she sees the result: 99.8% match.

Lexa swallows and watches as Clarke glances around the bar, looking around slowly until her eyes finally land on Lexa’s.

And she has this feeling in her gut that mostly leaves her breathless for a second.

She stares at her, and Lexa watches as her eyes recognize her and a small smile stretches across her face just like the one she was wearing before and the one she’s sporting now.

She looks at her like she knows her, and it’s a feeling that Lexa has, too.

It feels like everything clicks into place and everything makes so much sense .

This is right, whatever it is.

“So you’re the one…”


	2. Clarke

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "I'll post it tomorrow" my ass. 
> 
> I'm so sorry for taking exactly a month to finish this. 
> 
> I know, I know, it's not that hard since it's just a rewrite of the episode but it just didn't flow. 
> 
> It's Clarke's point of view! 
> 
> Hope you like it.

**Clarke.**

Clarke arrives, a tad late to the assigned restaurant, she doesn’t know how, but suddenly all she can focus on is how to control her uncontrollable beating hard and not the hour.

It feels like it’s going to burst out any minute now.

Clarke walks into the restaurant a few minutes later, a black cocktail dress that favors her most predominant assets. She’s satisfied with that, and she also knows her date will be too. What she doesn’t like is not knowing what’s next.

She looks briefly around, trying to keep her face neutral in an attempt to steady her even more frazzled nerves and beating heart before she reaches in her purse for her AI.

“How will I know who she or he is?” Clarke asks, regarding the device very closely and handling it like her life depended on it. She sneaks another look around the restaurant, to maybe see if someone recognizes her first, before settling on her device that comes to live showing a real live shot of a beautiful face reflecting back at her with black hair, a fine jaw line, a cute upturned nose, sinful lips and bright and curious green eyes. She could go on and on about what she sees in the screen but she could do it in real time.

She sees her and that’s when the AI confirms it.

_This is her._

Clarke takes in the image for a few more seconds to steel herself before depositing the device back into her purse. Her date, of course is hot and beautiful and Clarke is already happy to have signed up for this. She signed up willingly, right? She must have, but she doesn’t recall. Either way she’s so happy to see the woman on the flesh so she continues to walk until she’s a few steps away.

“You’re the one,” The woman yells while also standing up and resulting on a fork falling off the table and sending it across the floor. The noise makes Clarke look around amused to see if anyone else is watching this.

The woman was cute when flustered, even gorgeous up front and clumsy but she will leave it to nerves.

“Sorry!” the girl bursts. “Fork.” The woman holds the fork in question for Clarke to view. She’s smiling, and her cheeks are red, and she’s flustered, and she finds it so endearing.

“Clarke,” Clarke replies, smiling nonetheless, points to herself in introduction as a joke.

“Oh, no, my name’s not fork!” The woman is quick to correct, tossing down the fork on the table, making so much noise again. “It was just--”

“Yeah, I guessed that,” Clarke laughs, the woman is even more flustered than before and seriously she needs to count how many times she thinks it’s endearing before she runs out of numbers. “I was just--” she gestures between them, to indicate an attempt at a joke or a simply try at witty banter.

“I’m Lexa. Do you want to sit? Shall we sit?” She deviates around the table and gestures to it rapidly. Her hands let loose in a wild gesture and seriously, Clarke is already smitten with this dork. “It’s either that or stand, and oh you’re the one too.” Clarke banters, watching her with amusement but slight embarrassment as she just blurted the las part. Lexa chuckles and it’s a nice sound.

She shifts to walk around Lexa and proceeds to angle herself into the booth before she hears Lexa’s voice again. “Oh, I was sitting on that side-” Lexa begins, pointing at the spot. Clarke stops and stares at her with her eyebrows furrowed in confusion. She hopes seating arrangements are something that ticks the brunette off.

“Oh, do I…?” she begins, turning in confusion to see if she has to stand up and give her the spot.

“No! No, it doesn’t matter! Why did I bring it up?” Clarke laughs along with her. Clarke’s very aware that each time she laughs, it’s a genuine one. Lexa brings it up from her.

“Sorry! I’m still pretty nervous,” Lexa explains but the way she drops her arm around the side of the booth makes her look quite confident, relaxed and the opposite of nervous. “This is my first time, you know, with the system.” Lexa points at the AI in her hand.

“Me too,” Clarke adds relieved to be in the same position as her. Honestly, she was pretty nervous and she still is but the more she spends time with Lexa, the more comfortable she feels.  And either way, she definitely knows that Lexa is nervous based on her display earlier and it brings her comfort that she still got it.

“Oh really?” Lexa’s face shows surprise and Clarke can’t help but tell her the truth. “Yeah, I’m freaking the fuck out,” Clarke says with an honest smile, hoping she conveys both nervousness and her ‘so called game’.

“Come to mention it, you look terrified,” Lexa jokes and Clarke nods along, laughing again when Lexa smirks.

“Do I?” Clarke raises a pointed eyebrow. Going along with Lexa’s joke.

“Yeah, your fear is palpable.” Excuse me, other things are palpable, Clarke thinks.

“Or maybe I’m shaking with revulsion?” Clarke counters back. Raising a single eyebrow to show the other possibility.

“I don’t bite, unless you want me to. I mean if that’s what you fear is.” Lexa blurts out and it makes her laugh. Already thinking of ways that she wants the brunette to bite her.

They both stare at each other with cheeky smiles. “Should we stop talking about kinky things?”

“Yeah, maybe order some food?” Clarke bites her lip before glancing at the table when she doesn’t see a menu or something to base her order. “Do you know how we order?”

“I think we use these?” Lexa picks up her device to show her.

Just then the voice of Lexa’s coach says:

_Menu choices already established._

Before Clarke can utter her thoughts on that, a waiter appears and places food in front of them with their appointed meal.

“Well, I’m a pasta girl,” Clarke says, staring down at her plate, her lips twisted in a wry smile. It’s her favorite but it’s not something she would order on a date. Eating pasta on a date is a no-no for her, but it seems like here it is.

She looks up to see what her date got. Maybe she could steal something from her. “Yeah I’m a Fishcake kind of girl.” She doesn’t think Lexa’s a fishcake kind of girl but that’s what they got.

Her first bite down is heavenly and she can’t help but let it know. She moans in appreciation of the meal too many times to consider it appropriate but no one is watching expect for Lexa and she likes how easy it is to make her blush.

“Can I try some?” Lexa points at Clarke’s plate.

“Are we allowed to do that?” Clarke asks, looking around the restaurant to see if that’s allowed. She doesn’t see couples sharing their meal, but she doesn’t see anyone who can oppose to it.  It’s just a meal at the end of the day and it’s just one bite.

“Screw it.”

“Yeah, screw it!” Lexa agrees, leaning forward in time for her forkful of pasta to go into her mouth.

“So, we’re both first-timers.” Clarke points out when the conversation stalls. Lexa sort of hums in agreement. “Should we check our expiry date?” She asks curiously. Not because she wants to get it over with, but genuinely wanting to know how much time left she has with Lexa.

“Yeah, good plan.” At least she seems to agree and hopes it’s for the same reasons as hers.

“Yeah? All right, um so I think it’s under info” Clarke explains it while she picks up the device.

“Yes, uh, tap to reveal. We have to tap to reveal at the same time.”

“Ok, so on three, two, one. GO!” They both tap it at the same time and instantly the time it’s revealed.

It shows the estimated time is 12 hours.

“12 hours?” Clarke asks surprised. Tapping on the screen to see if it’s a mistake or a system failure. They couldn’t have 12 hours. She hoped and-

Hope breeds eternal misery.

“Yeah, 12 hours,” Lexa repeats, looking at her own AI with a frown. She equals that frown. “Ok,” Clarke says dejectedly, because she can’t fight the system, right?

“It’s a bit, I don’t know…”

“Yeah.”

“It’s short, right?”

And suddenly the numbers on their AI begin counting down.

“Oh, and getting shorter. I didn’t realize it would sort of countdown like. That’s sort of sad.” Sad is not the appropriate word, but she goes with it because it’s sad but what she wants to really say is heartbreaking and she doesn’t even know Lexa for long.

“Maybe we should eat quickly?” Lexa suggests, and It’s an idea, it’s something.

It cheers her up.

“Yeah, maybe we should.” Clarke agrees, slowly putting her device down to instead pick up her fork and watching for Lexa’s obvious giddiness as Lexa takes a big bite of her food.

“The race is on.” Clarke laughs when Lexa chews faster and encourages her to go faster.

“Come on, hurry up!” Lexa grins when Clarke takes a similar bite, but she’s busy trying not to laugh out loud and instead giggles and the smile that Lexa offers back, leaves her breathless.

* * *

They finish their meals in record time, and wait outside for their designated shuttle to come take them to their next destination. The dating program maintains that couples go to their own living quarters, where they will spend the duration of their time together doing whatever it is they want to do or have.

It’s a weird arrangement, it puts a lot of expectations on the date itself but since she only has so many hours to spend with Lexa, Clarke finds herself less anxious and more eager to get there.

And the more she thinks about it, she shivers at the prospect of-

Lexa must have taken her shiver wrong, since she takes her own jacket and puts it on her shoulders and if that hasn’t have her blushing, watching strong arms barely fit into the white shirt and the suspenders she’s wearing then she can blame it on the “cold.”

“I guess this is us.” There’s a white automatic rickshaw that pulls just besides them and it opens up automatically without prompting manual labor. So far, Clarke is impressed.

“And this takes us to the place?”

“I guess.”

“After you,” Lexa gestures with a grin and Clarke gives her a thankful smile as she gets in. She’s a gentlewoman.

“Thank you,” Clarke replies, taking her seat.

They sit next to each other in silence, even if it the cabin is spacious they can’t help but be pressed against each other. Clarke doesn’t mind, no, she doesn’t mind one bit.

Clarke is suddenly very conscious of everything Lexa, and her mind becomes nervously too blank to come up with clever conversation.

There’s a lull in the conversation but they can’t help it when they soak up the scenery and they don’t care much for idle conversation.

“It’s massive.” Lexa says when they look to the building dome they were just in and the outside of it and the giant wall that covers just one side of the whole space they’re in, Lexa leans across her to stare out the window and Clarke can certainly feel the muscles of Lexa’s arms occasionally and silently brushing along hers, and the firmness of her thighs making themselves known with every bump in the road that they encounter after that.

And she has a dilemma.

She doesn’t want the ride to end because she wants to keep feeling Lexa against her, even if it’s minimal but she does want to get there faster so that they can continue whatever they have further but, she also doesn’t want to get there because it inevitably will bring their time close to ending and she definitely doesn’t want that.

* * *

They stand just outside of the house. “Here we are!” Lexa announces.

“Yeah.” Clarke replies even if it wasn’t a question.

There’s a biometric lock for their handprint to open the door. “Do you want to open it?” Lexa asks, always thinking of her first and it warms her heart.

“Go ahead,” Clarke nods in her direction, and Lexa smiles at her. “All right.”

Lexa takes her sweet time doing it so. Maybe, she’s doing it on purpose so she messes with her but Clarke quickly slaps her hand on the lock. “Too slow” she taunts, her eyebrow raised in contention when Lexa didn’t get to mess with her in the first place.

Lexa rolls her eyes at her and laughs. “You’re ridiculous.”

Clarke puts her hand to her chest and bites back. “Says the fork.”

“And funny.” Lexa says and brings a laugh out of her.

“I know.”

They stare at each other in silence, regarding each other under the soft glow of the floodlight, and it starts to feel too serious for them because they don’t know how to take the next step. Fortunately, for them Lexa does.

She opens up the door ajar and peaks her head inside, blocking the view for inside from her.

“Oh no, it’s a nightmare.” Lexa in all seriousness says. Clarke gapes at her and tries to think of ways they still can make it worth, but seeing as Lexa’s façade slowly peels away she scrutinizes her. “You’re kidding?” Clarke complains.

“Yeah, I am,” Lexa admits, and Clarke gives her a sarcastic smile.

Lexa opens the door fully and they both enter the apartment. The room immediately is overflowed with soft light, it has two yellow couches and a roaring fireplace in the center. It’s warm thanks to the fireplace but it’s also warm because it’s cozy, and it feels like a home.

“It’s nice,” Clarke says softly, looking around. It really is. It’s like the home she would have if she would’ve created it. But even if it feels weirdly like home she can’t help but think that it still going to be just for a couple of hours and there’s nothing she can do about it. She pulls away from that thought and points out to a a very looking lamp that sits on the table in the corner. “I like that lamp.”

“Yeah, it’s really incredible, that lamp,” Lexa chuckles, her tone is full of sarcasm and it makes her roll her eyes at the comment.

“Fuck off.”

Clarke continues walking until she stumbles upon the bedroom where a queen size bed is placed conventionally in the middle of the room.

It seems inviting but also presumptuous for her to think of that bed, her and Lexa in it. Did she mentioned inviting?

They both turn to stare at it for a few moments, the silence charged with unspoken questions. “Alright, that’s uh…” Lexa mumbles, and Clarke giggles uncomfortable because it’s her defense mechanism to an unexpected situation.

Clarke continues walking towards the right side of the bed and opens the door in the corner. “There’s an ensuite,” Clarke says, breaking the silence. It huge and she loves it already. It has both a shower and a bath and she’s comforted by the idea of having both and she doesn’t know why.

“So is it a shower or a bath?” Lexa asks, she doesn’t know why but she asks.

“Both?” Clarke smirks when she thinks Lexa thinks the same as her.

“Oh, that’s good.” Lexa says lamely.

“Uh. Well, I’m just gonna use the bathroom,” Clarke gestures behind her, and Lexa nods, immediately shifting to head in the opposite direction. “Yeah, I’ve got to uh…over here.”

In the bathroom, Clarke pulls out her AI and sits down on top of the closed toilet, staring at it hard.

Her jaw clenches as she whispers.

“Ok, seriously, what are we meant to do?” Clarke pleads, hoping for some sort of answer. What are the rules? She wants to do anything, whatever they’re comfortable and feeling but she doesn’t know the rules or what she wants or Lexa for that matter want.

_Query too broad. Please narrow._

“Well, I mean, are we just meant to...I don’t know, like, just go at it?” Clarke whispers with more exasperation, unable to make herself ask what she really wants to ask.

_Define ‘go at it’._

“Fucking hell!” She angrily half yells.

So much for helpful guidance.

Here goes nothing.

* * *

She exits the bathroom and sees that Lexa is in the other room.

“I could just sleep here.” 

The loveseat is small and it’s hardly what Clarke would call functional or comfortable for that matter. Lexa would be folded up and the kinks she would have in the morning were not worth it. What it is, is amusing, Clarke cannot fathom how that would be what Lexa really wants.

“Don’t be absurd. You’ll be scrunched up in a ball,” Clarke explains surveying the loveseat once more.

Lexa shakes her head and curls up on the couch, awkwardly tucking her long legs in close to her chin as she scoots backwards, trying to squeeze the entirety of her frame into the small space to show her that she was going to be ok.

She barely fits and brings a smile on her face.

“It’s not awful,” Lexa says, completely unconvincingly.

“The bed’s pretty big, I’m sure we can both fit in it,” Clarke says. She wants to let her go off the lie, and Lexa sounds all too eager to jump off the loveseat and agree that makes Clarke laugh at her eagerness.

“Eager much?”

“Shut up.”

* * *

They get into bed after initially a sort of ‘which side is your side’ type of stare contest until they just settle as they are. They’re still fully clothed, both of them on their backs staring at the ceiling.

The silence is not awkward at all, and it should be but Clarke wants to fill it with her running thoughts for once.

“Must have been wild before the system.” She’s thinking about dating in general, and how it seems completely unpredictable and hard without the AI’s to do all the planning for them. The AI is based on a formula, and a specific way of doing things that will deliver something great, something good, something almost perfect.

“What do you mean?” Lexa asks, turning to face her slightly while Clarke does the same. The room is dark but Clarke can still see Lexa on the little light that filters through parts of the curtain window.

“Well, people had to do the whole relationship thing themselves to work out who they wanna be with.”

“Hmm. Option paralysis. So many choices, you end up not knowing which one you want.”

“Yeah, exactly, and if things seem awful, they’d have to figure out whether they wanted to break up with someone.” Oh god, she would not be good at that, or maybe she would. The only thing she knows if they would’ve met randomly and they would’ve started something, she wouldn’t end things because she wouldn’t want Lexa to go, just like now.

“How to break up with someone? Fuck that’s hard.” Lexa agrees. 

“It’s a nightmare.”

“It’s not like when it’s all mapped out.”

“God, no. It’s so much simpler when it’s all mapped out!”

The conversation ends, and silence falls upon them.

Clarke let’s out a undefeated sigh. “This is weird, though.”

“It really is,” Lexa she says it with a laugh.

Clarke decides to graze the top of Lexa’s hand with her own so Lexa turns her hand to be almost closer to Clarke’s. Clarke slides her hand into hers, and she immediately lets her fingers clasp around her own.

Clarke smiles in the darkness not fully aware that Lexa does too and then she tries to sleep but it never comes and then she’s talking about nothing and everything and she finally feels like it’s going to be ok.

* * *

They step out of the house and into the morning fresh air with the sun shining at its top. Their time almost running out, ending whatever they had. And they had something, at least Clarke thinks so.

The rest of their night was kind of a whirlwind, they talked, laughed, cried from laughter, and shared more than they would ever thought they could’ve in a short amount of time but the morning follow up with some sense of dread for their goodbyes.

There are two rickshaws already waiting for them, they’re in opposite directions and it makes Clarke’s stomach coil at the thought of saying goodbye. Saying goodbye to Lexa who for all tense and purposes could be the one for her, but she’s not and she has to face it.

“Well then,” Clarke says as they emerge from the apartment.

“So...”

“Thanks for being my first,” Clarke winks and squeezes her arm appreciatively.

“Oh yeah absolutely, thank you for being mine.”

Just then there’s the annoying sound of a ticking clock and she pulls out her AI that beeps even louder as the time comes to an end.

“It was great, you know. You were nice.” Lexa in the end says.

“So were you,” Clarke dips her head and her eyelashes flutter, she debates if she really needs to ask her to stay or just get on with the fact that it is what it is and so before she knows it, Clarke is talking again with her hand clasped in Lexa’s. “If we had this time again, you would totally get it, by the way…” Clarke steps away with a sinful smirk on her face but her hand remains.

“You’d get it, too you know,” Lexa finally responds when her voice returns.

“We fucked that one up, didn’t we?” Clarke pouts.

Another chance.

What she’d give for just another one.

“Yeah, totally.”

The time finally ticks down to zero, and Clarke realizes their fingers are still firmly interlocked, neither wants to let go.

They keep their hands held and arms outstretched until the last possible second.

They finally part, and Clarke walks away in a complete daze. She looks back one more time just as Lexa does and gives her an encouraging smile. But still something in her chest shifts and crumbles. She inhales sharply and clenches her jaw, before turning around and leaving her behind.

* * *

“I guess I just don’t see the point in something that short. I mean twelve hours.” Clarke says to her AI while she runs down the path that overlooks the lake.

She abhors running, and her breaths are labored, but she needs to do something to get rid of the anxiety that has taken place since meeting Lexa. Not meeting her, she corrects. Leaving her.

She exhales furiously and picks up the pace.

_Even your reaction to a brief encounter provides the system with valuable information._

“Yeah, well I didn’t even do anything. The system thinks I’m a prude.” Clarke stops, clutching at the cramp in her side, wincing in discomfort. Clarke laments, staring out over the water.

_The system makes no moral judgements._

Clarke scoffs, rolling her eyes. Yeah because if it did then she would be in for it. She’s doing making her moral judgements all on her own. Just then the AI rings with a new notification.

“What was that?”

_Another relationship._

“What, already?” It shouldn’t surprise her but it does. Still Clarke just frowns, and tosses a pebble across the lake and watches as it skips.

1, 2, 3, 4 times.

* * *

She’s already waiting for her to date to appear. She’s wearing another tight cocktail dress, this time in a light blue color. Her blonde hair is pulled up but it feels like it’s tugging at the base of her skull, annoyingly begging to be released.

In other words, she’s already over it.

She feels tired, and completely disinterested in meeting someone new, but it’s the system, and she needs to trust it. Or so everyone says.

A tall, dark figure enters the restaurant and Clarke inhales sharply. He’s tall dressed crisply in a blue outfit, one that matches her own and he has a smirk on his face that makes him look…Intriguing.

“Holy fuck. Tell me that’s him,” Clarke whispers into the AI as the man slowly begins approaching the table.

_I cannot confirm identity until a personal introduction is made._

Clarke quickly hides the AI and watches.

He’s attractive, and his cocky attitude from what she can tell is annoyingly charming. Superficial relationships are just as important, right? They’ll sort out personalities later, she thinks.

Sure enough, the man glides up to the table with confident strides and a wicked smile and he nods in Clarke’s direction.

“Hi.”

“Hi.”

_Identity confirmed._

“I like your hair.” He says but he doesn’t look at her hair but instead to her cleavage and she sort of internally rolls her eyes so hard at that.

“Yours is good too.” Clarke denotes. He has floppy black hair and it looks more taken care off than her own must days.

“It’s all my own.” He jokes and Clarke can’t help but laugh out loud at that attempt (He has a receding hair line but she doesn’t mention that). It’s a fake laugh, but he doesn’t know the difference yet. It’s not like Lexa and her attempts without trying to make her laugh. “It’s funny.”

* * *

Ok, so it’s not that bad.

Finn, is charming but he acts like a fuck boy and Clarke can’t pretend that she doesn’t know what that is or what to expect from him.

She pushes those type of thoughts aside in order to focus on what’s important. Their expiration date.

Somehow she wishes to be the same as it was with Lexa, meaning less time. The difference is, with Lexa she just wanted more time.

“Ok, so on three.”

“Two, one.”

“Oh. Interesting.” He leans in and actually looks pleased when he looks down to her chest area again. “9 months.”

Oh god.

Clarke quirks an eyebrow, and simply nods with a fake smile on her face.

Well, she better make that work.

“Well, cheers.”

“Cheers.”

* * *

The way to their house is apparently so dull that she almost fell asleep. Not even on his shoulder but on her hand while he insisted to keep her own eyes to her chest.

What’s up with these dude and her boobs?

They arrive at the house, and it looks identical to the one she shared with Lexa. The thought makes her mouth dry, but she clears her throat and tries to focus on the moment as Finn leads them inside.

“Pretty much the same as my last one,” Finn says, carrying on with his air of unimpressed boredom.

“How many of these have you had?” She’s curious to know, because apart from knowing that he likes the outdoors, be a rebel and be into her boobs she doesn’t know much about him.

“Relationships? So far? Five.”

“Oh.” Clarke chuckles nervously at that, but she supposes it takes the guesswork out of things. He’s going to have the upper hand in whatever happens, just for today.

“I’m an old hand, I suppose. Which brings me to one important thing, I’m still deciding about this whole monogamy thing because I find it so boring. I don’t think I’m meant for it. I like to share the love, you know what I mean?” He says, and it’s good to know before she could ever pretend that she didn’t see how he eyed the waitress or the other woman from different tables. How his fuckboy attitude is just confirmed.

She nods and shrugs and pretends like she gets it.

“Listen, I’m just going to jump in the shower.” He says while he takes off his shirt, not a six pack in sight.  “I won’t be long.”

“Ok.”

* * *

9 months .

Clarke can’t help but feel bitter at the fact that it would have been so much better to spend this much time with someone else. Ok not someone else but Lexa.

“Hey.”

“Hi.”

Finn is standing in all his naked glory and she rakes her eyes all over him and doesn’t find anything surprising.

“So, listen, if you’re ok with it, this is official relationship five for me, and I’ve found it’s best to have sex straight away upfront.” Finn interrupts her thoughts far quicker than Clarke expects.

“Right, yeah,” Clarke nods along dumbly.

“Kind of breaks the ice,” She’s thinking of other ways to break the ice, like a fallen fork.

“It gives an early overview of compatibility and so on.  And let’s not pretend that I haven’t wanted you since I saw you and you have too.”

She cringes at that but still offers him a smile.  He does something on his AI like he swipes at it.

“So I’m consenting to everything now. Whenever you feel comfortable doing the same-”

She takes her own AI and consents it as well.

She’s not a prude and Finn’s right.

The quicker, the better.  

Oh, how that turns out to be true.

* * *

The sex is…not good.

Not earth shattering, not mind blowing, but almost passable.

Ok, it wasn’t good.

She’s cranky and unsatisfied as she lays awake and her body feels temporarily sated (by her own hands), which makes this time together a little easier to swallow.

* * *

 

Several days later, Finn and her attend a pairing day celebration for one lucky couple that the system has matched together. It gives her hope that it’s something she can look forward to it when it’s over with Finn and with whoever comes next.

A fleeting thought passes through her and Lexa is the most prominent one.

They arrive at the venue which is held outdoors on a nearby park, with a pond and string lights all over the patio, creating a fairytale illusion that would look so much better in the night.

They’re standing near a brick archway, talking to some people before Finn takes her hand and makes a joke about someone else’s boobs that makes her almost laugh. Laugh at how uncomfortable she feels and at the pitiful faces everyone around them gives her.

She looks around, possibly looking for people who were offended by Finn’s words and that’s when she sees her.

It takes everything in her not to go immediately to say hi, but instead she feels Finn take her hand and the applause going on when the so called ultimate match couple march to the stage.

She stares at the boy with short black hair, googles on his head, he’s smiling from ear to ear. Standing next to her is a girl with a saccharine smile. They look perfect together, meaning that they’re exactly what Clarke pictured the poster couple to be like.

After all, they are a picture perfect soulmates.

“So I’d just like to say, have faith in the system, because it DOES deliver! It did for us!” Maya howls, and Jasper with a dopey smile nods vigorously. They grab each other’s hands and giggle together like they have a secret on their own, and maybe they do.

Clarke smiles despite her own doubts.

“You have so many experiences and then one day it pairs you up with your ultimate match! The best in show as it were.” Maya keeps on adding while Jasper howls, literally does in happiness which makes Maya laugh and everyone in the yard does so as well.

“So if you’re having any doubts just hang on in there.” Maya asserts.

“Because it really does work.” Jasper exclaims.

Everyone starts to clap and she does too, a similar action that everyone copies except Lexa and she feel so bad for her when she sees her frown.

* * *

Later on, after the sun goes down, there’s an elaborate spread of food for everyone. She somehow hopes Lexa is near so Clarke leaves Finn for a moment, and it’s not that he has yet to notice since he was talking to a raven haired beauty near the lake and so she starts to wander, before she catches the sight of familiar brunette locks and steady hands picking up a chicken tender on her hands and chewing away in front of a gorgeous woman who rolls her eyes at Lexa and goes away.

It’s not surprising that Lexa is all buttoned up and formal. Physically, she looks impeccable, and untouchable, (and glamorous, and expensive, and probably ten other adjectives that Clarke can’t quite think of at the moment) but underneath it all, it turns out she’s funny, gentle and a dork. Her heart flutters as she makes her way over just thinking of her, tapping Lexa on the shoulder and barely containing the huge smile on her face.

Lexa turns and her face lights up in that way she has, and Clarke forgets to breathe. “Hi!”

She knows probably Lexa wants to say hi, but her cheeks are stuffed with food. It’s so not Lexa but at the same time it is and she can’t help but feel relieved.

“Was that, uh, your…?” Clarke points at Echo’s retreating form, who stomps away and glares at Lexa and now Clarke. She has to give it to her, if looks could kill they both would’ve been dead.

Lexa nods, and points. “Yeah, Echo.” She says with her mouth almost full.

Clarke nods knowingly. “Oh, Echo. What a name.” A name that matches the face and attitude.

Lexa nods but then she’s coughing up a storm and Clarke feels like she’s joking.  “You ok?” Clarke laughs, shaking her head because she doesn’t believe her antics.

“No, you’re not being…” Clarke looks around as Lexa looks at her panicked and still coughing. “Serious.”

“Oh my God. Ok, this is happening. Ok, um, just…” Clarke pats her on the back several times and Lexa finally coughs up the killer chicken and launches it crassly onto Clarke’s shoe.

“Oh. Thanks!” Lexa gratefully says, wiping her mouth and taking a deep breath, while Clarke inspects her vomited shoe. It’s salvageable, just barely. But she doesn’t mind.

“You look well!”

“Thanks. I’d return the compliment, but you’ve just spat food all over my shoe, so…” Clarke looks down again so that Lexa follows her look and when Lexa does she laughs. “To be fair, it is a revolting shoe so,” Lexa defends herself with her arms raised and deep laugh and Clarke is offended.

Ok, no she’s not.

“Then all the better to kick you with!” Clarke exclaims, and she does. She literally kicks Lexa in the shin in a jest, but Lexa stares at Clarke like it hurt.

“Was that really hard?” Clarke covers her mouth in apology and to further contain her laugh but she lets it out at the end when Lexa mutters an ‘ouch’.

“I’m so sorry, fuck!” Clarke grabs Lexa's arm, completely horrified that she just did that and it actually hurt her but Lexa’s laugh is contagious and she’s laughing with her.

It doesn’t matter that everyone looks at them funnily as they keep on laughing because it’s perfect and just like them and Clarke doesn’t want it to end.

But end, it does. They’re interrupted by Finn who comes to Clarke’s side, sliding his arm around her shoulder and preening at Lexa. He smirks at Lexa and Clarke has the urge to punch him and tell him that he can have anyone except Lexa.

“Oh! Oh, hm…uh…” Clarke stumbles through it, because she doesn’t want either of them to be aware of each other, for very different reasons. “Finn, this is Lexa. Lexa, this is Finn.”

“Hello Finn.” Lexa greets him coldly and Clarke smiles internally when Lexa avoids his advances and gives her a reassuring smile.

“We were together for a bit.” Clarke explains to Finn, before looking back at her.

“A small bit.” Lexa supplies, because it seemed like she was telling their private joke.

She gets it.

“Yeah, just before we…” Clarke gestures to her and Finn and offers Lexa an apologetic smile.

“So you two? Oh. That’s…great. So I mean, it looks like you two make a great team.” Lexa says and even manages to fake a smile.

A fake smile that Clarke sees right through it. (When did that happen? Clarke thinks. When did she noticed the different type of smiles Lexa has if they only had a short time?)

Just then the beautiful woman from before appears right at Lexa’s side and offers them a simple nod.

Clarke is suddenly self-conscious about the fact that she’s actually paired with a boy (not a man) and she is forced to take in the picture of high society, with Lexa and Echo standing in front of her like actual Vogue fashion models.

“They’re about to leave.” Echo only offers, and that’s when the happily matched couple run to their rickshaw and the guests at the party begin clapping at their departure.

It sinks then that it would probably be the last time she sees Lexa but there’s nothing she can say or do since their current matches were there and Lexa probably doesn’t feel the same.  “I’ll see you.” Clarke waves goodbye, but her eyes stay on Lexa’s even as she’s walking away. Lexa seems sad but Clarke thinks that maybe she’s just projecting her own feelings.

Lexa nods quickly as a goodbye. “Yeah, bye.”

* * *

Clarke has resigned herself that maybe this means something, that he means something, but it’s impossible and she has to take it all in stride.

It’s the little things, like the way he sighs every time he drinks something, the way his crocked grin turns lascivious when he either stares at her body or other women. The way he pushes his hair backwards in a “sexy” move or that’s what he calls it every single minute making his hair greasy and his showers longer for his “skin care” routine.

The way their talks are nothing but chit chat and he has no deep emotional thoughts inside him. He lacks the emotional intelligence she looks for in a partner. What Lex-

No, she can’t think of her and she can’t say anything to him.

She doesn’t say anything until she’s tired of pretending and she just wants to sleep but his sighs are driving her crazy.

“You know that noise you make?”

“What noise?” Finn asks her with a frown, like she just interrupted his entire existence.  

She makes the noise and Finn asks dumbly as if he didn’t do it just seconds ago. “Do I do that?”

“Yeah, you do, quite often.”

“Does it bother you?” he asks annoyed.

“Yeah.”

“I’ll try not to.”

“Ok.”

* * *

He does it again and again and again.

Clarke pulls her device and taps it and 2 months show on the screen.

Then it’s up to 7 weeks .

3 weeks.

17 seconds.

“So, it’s been great, really.” Finn says. “Shame it has to end.” He stares at her boobs while he says it and she has to refrain to punch him even though she wants to.

“But end it must.” She says politely and before he grabs her and pulls into a hug she scurries away and she’s in the rickshaw and clambering toward the hull. “Ok bye.”

* * *

She knows her AI will have another relationship selected for her anytime so she spends it leisurely by the pool. She’s praying whatever is out there that it won’t be as long as the last one and if it is, is with someone like Lexa.

So she has learned to cope living with someone she despises, with someone who doesn’t match her in any way and she really hopes it’s someone great this time.

True to form, that same day, she gets another notification. “Another partner already?”

_That is correct._

She nods reluctantly, because what else can she do about it. So she gets herself dressed, and goes to the same restaurant, and waits at a booth for another date.

* * *

His name is Bellamy, and he’s got beautiful brown eyes, moppy hair and a kind, gentle smile. And, as luck would have it, Clarke’s prayers are answered because there’s no investment. They only have 36 hours together.

It’s perfect.

Their time is simple and fun, with no expectations and no strings.

He’s better than Finn that’s for sure but the lack of quality time they could spend learning about each other they spend it on knowing each other’s bodies and Clarke’s okay with the that. It’s not like what happened with Lexa and even that meant more than this.

They part ways amicably, shaking hands and a smile.

* * *

The cycle repeats with another 36 hour fling.

Her name is Nylah and she’s blonde and charming in ways that leave her a little breathless. She has a soft and defined body and she touches her so lightly afraid that’s she going to break but she never does and they part ways with Clarke thinking she was sweet and Nylah wishing her the best.

Then there’s Roan. He’s a little bit intimidating at first but he treats her with respect and she likes that, she likes him. Ok just barely but his abdominals have abdominals, and Clarke’s head is spinning by the end of it, but in a pleasant way that somehow gives her a little peace of mind before they’re forced to part.

Then it’s more faces, more bodies that she can possibly remember all their names until there’s Luna and Ontari and they’re both so different but so similar at the same time and one of them reminds her of Lexa but none of them and the ones before can compare to the brunette and she’s left to ponder if she will ever find someone better, her ultimate match.

She doesn’t see the point of having short fling after short fling but it’s way better than having to endure once more the endless suffering of having to cohabit with someone you despise for so long.

There’s another match for her after Ontari and she goes through the same routine.

Clarke walks into the restaurant yet again, and even with her recent string of semi-success, she feels like she’s stuck on autopilot. The same flings, the same restaurant, the same apartment. The same motions, all lather, rinse, repeat. She’s tired, and starting to wonder when it will all pay off.

That’s until she sees her.

* * *

Clarke glances around the room until she’s struck by wavy brunette hair and a chiseled jaw. Lexa is staring down at the table with such a forlorn expression that Clarke wants to skip her date entirely and go to her.

She’s never seen Lexa look so low, but of course, how would she know? They’ve only spent 12 hours together. Ok maybe that was enough time to get to know her on a deeper level but still she finds herself wanting to know more. Sometimes Clarke forgets it was indeed that short. She just feels like she knows her. Lexa’s face tugs at her heartstrings, and she decides that she’s going to at least say hi, even if it’s not her final destination for the evening, but when she looks back at her AI her heart practically jumps from her chest. Lexa’s face is reflected back at her, and Clarke practically skips to the table before the machine can decide it’s a mistake.

“Hello, you.” she says, and she stands expectantly, waiting for Lexa to look up. When she does, she smiles and Clarke’s stomach flips.

“Hi!” Lexa stands immediately, keeping the silverware on the table this time, and opens her arms for a hug. Clarke falls into them and wraps her arms tightly around Lexa. She’s warm and firm and Clarke fits perfectly against her.

She sighs as Lexa speaks. “Is this right?” it’s more than right.

“Yeah.”

“I mean-“

“Yeah, I didn’t think the system would hook us up again,” Clarke muses as she reluctantly detaches herself and goes to sit down.

“No me either,” Lexa agrees as she sits down as well. “I mean, I hope it’s right, obviously but-”

Clarke rolls her eyes and smiles, and Lexa grins. She leans down and taps her AI to show her she’s right, they’re right, this is perfect.

“Coach, is this the right table?”

_Yes, that is correct._

Finally. It's like she can breathe again. They sit and stare at each other with cheesy smiles and Clarke allows the sense of relief to wash over her.

“Ok, well…” Lexa reaches for her own AI and Clarke holds out her hand.

“Wait, umm. Can we not check the expiry date?” She asks with a fluttering hand, and Lexa puts hers away slowly even though her face shows confusion. “Uh, why?”

“I’m sick of it,” Lexa’s eyes soften, and Clarke is so thankful for everything that she is.

“The system’s just bounced me from short fling after short flings. I know they’re short flings, they’re just meaningless, and I get really detached. It’s like I’m not really there.” Clarke bites her lip, and she takes pleasure in the fact that Lexa seems to understand.

“So the other week, I was with this guy. God knows who, basically just a haircut. And I literally had this out-of-body experience. I wandered out of my body, and I sat in this chair across the room and I watched myself fucking this guy. And I was, like, what is that all about?”

“That’s pretty detached,” Lexa agrees. She seems to ponder her words and when she finally says them she knows why she was so sad sitting there. “But when it’s a long term thing, it’s just as bad, you know. It’s like watching the clock like you’re a prisoner, counting the hours, the minutes.”  

“Oh God, I’ve been there.” Clarke nods sympathetically. The thought of Finn makes her shiver but she pushes it away for this.

“I was basically just surviving.”

“Life should be more than just surviving, don’t we deserve that?” Clarke asks. Just a few minutes with Lexa and she’s already telling her the deepest thoughts.

“Yeah, let’s not check the expiration date, then.” Lexa nods in approval.

“Yeah.” Clarke holds out her hand, and Lexa smiles as she takes it in her own. “It’s a deal.”

“Deal.” Her fingers are so soft and just like their bodies, her hands fit perfectly around the other.

“Let’s bring chicken fingers.” Lexa makes a joke and seems embarrassed about it but it’s funny and Clarke can’t help but laugh and it’s the first real one since….the last time she saw Lexa.

Clarke looks at the way the soft light dances across Lexa’s face, illuminating her already too-bright smile, and she promises herself that this time, they’ll do things right. That she won’t let her leave.

* * *

They’re standing in the darkness of the bedroom neither one bothering to turn on a light, keeping just the natural light to guide them through. They stand face to face, and the more silence reigns over them, the more nervous and anxious Clarke feels.

It’s Lexa and that means something to her. She means something to her.

“So?”

“So.”

“Might as well,” Clarke says casually, looking at the bed. She raises an eyebrow in jest and looks at Lexa with a pointed lip bite.

“I suppose we have to. I don’t know how much time we’ve got.” Lexa says and they’re both reminded of their time so they have to pick up the pace they were dancing around each other.

“Yeah, it could be ten minutes. Think you could last ten minutes?” Clarke jokes, and Lexa rolls her eyes at her. “Fuck you.”

“Oh, you’re about to.” Clarke raises both of her eyebrows and wiggles them as a joke. Lexa seems to enjoy the comment but doesn’t do anything about it. “All right. Ok, then. Wait, One of us should get undressed first,” Clarke suggests, putting some distance from Lexa and points towards the brunette to take the first step.

“Why only one of us?” Lexa asks, narrowing her eyes, not quite catching up what she is hinting at.

“It’ll be funny.” That’s the only explanation she can give her. It’s not funny, it’s just she’s just blurting out the first thing that comes to her mind and that was one of them.

“Go on then. Undress for me.” Lexa gestures at her with a smirk and she feels her smirk resonate with her lower regions.

She stares at the curves of her body, and the way her suit is hugging her hips and well defined arms, and she swallows thickly. It’s all fun and games until that fabric comes off.

“No, no. It was my idea.” Clarke looks at her smugly and pushes the lapels of Lexa’s jacket to prove her point.

They hold each other’s stare for a few seconds, neither one wanting to give in, until Lexa finally caves. And Clarke grin turns smug. “All right.” Lexa turns her back to her and begins to take off her jacket and then unbutton her shirt.

“This is kind of weird!” Lexa stops to complain, but Clarke’s eyes intensely stare at her and the way her body moves to undress. But she doesn’t only want to peel off the layers of clothing but her deep layers of consciousness to and she hopes Lexa wants that too. She’s been with so many people that only wanted her for her body and it’s a nice change to have her wanting other things too. 

“You will make up for it in a minute,” Clarke’s voice is low and throaty and it makes Lexa’s fingers tremble on one of the buttons when she finally takes her shirt off.

“Why am I the only one who gets-“ Lexa begins to say, before she presses her lips against hers. Her hands wander all over her hair and Lexa immediately grabs her by the waist possessively and with warmth at the same time and she’s already a puddle on her arms.

Clarke corners her against the table and kisses her forcefully with everything she has.

She could do it all day, every day until they’re allowed to and even then if they’re not she doesn’t think she could do this with another person.

Her body fits around Lexa’s, and Lexa’s body is a wonderland, she begins to learn. She’s all definition and steel where she is curves and softness. She is hot to the touch and she’s soft with the way her lips trace her body.

Lexa’s mouth finds her body so soft, so perfect, so hers while her own hands find Lexa’s body so perfect, so delicate and it’s finally a couple of hours later that she physically can’t continue anymore.

Her only thought after that is how her whole body molds itself to be the big spoon to Lexa’s little one and how their fingers intertwined finally have their place.

And how it feels soft and perfect.

And real.

But already doomed.

* * *

The next day and for the next couple of days Clarke finally feels that everything is coming into place that everything that happened was worth it.

All of it is worth it for this moment and the moments she has spent with Lexa.

Finn, Nylah, Bellamy all of them and all of the memories. Because now there’s Lexa, and now there’s them , and if Clarke never gets in another relationship as long as she lives, she’ll always have the memory of this. She can’t possibly forget her or this, she can’t and she won’t.

Everything they do and say it’s almost enough to make her forget how exhausting this has all been, and how deep down, she’s still questioning the system. Because here she is, with Lexa, who she is perfectly content to spend an immeasurable amount of time with talking about everything, talking about nothing, laughing, crying of laughter, kissing, hugging, fucking, and yet, she’s still waiting for her so-called ultimate match and still thinks it’s bullshit that they could ever find someone better than Lexa.

She wants to believe in probabilities and sequences, in formulas and logic. But the more she continues knowing Lexa, and the more she looks at her and their relationship and allows herself to feel, the less she begins to understand.

“What if there is no scrutiny? It’s just putting us together in any old order, and we all go along with it, cause they’re always telling us how clever it is?” She begins, the bounces in her step shows how agitated she is for the subject. It’s the most simple reason she can think of.

“Yeah, but it does put people with the one,” Lexa says, and Clarke pulls her forward while her hands are still connected, up the stairs of the gazebo in the park. “It’s got a 99.8% success rate.”

“But how do you know they’re perfect matches? I mean, what if all it’s actually doing is gradually wearing us down, putting us in one relationship after another for random durations in a random sequence? Each time you get a little bit more pliable, a little bit more broken, until eventually it coughs up the final offering and says that’s the one.” She feels this in all sorts of levels. It already has broken down to the point that she can’t think of the future perfect match that couldn’t and wouldn’t compare to the brunette standing in front of her, the brunette with a pensive smile and questioning eyes.

“And by that point you are so defeated and so exhausted that you just accept it, you settle!” Clarke puts her arms around her neck and pulls her close while Lexa does the same around her middle. “And then you have to live the rest of your life convincing yourself you didn’t.”

“Well done. That goes my idea of the one.”

“I mean it.”

“Do you want to hear my theory?” Clarke nods as she takes a step backwards, putting some distance between them. “Let’s assume the system isn’t random, it’s a sophisticated as they say it is,” Lexa begins to explain as she reaches for her AI. “Right, so using these, it consumes up all your reactions yeah? It builds up a complex profile. Every crazy thought you’ve ever had, all your dreams and your weaknesses and -”

“And your mad theories.”

“Yeah, like, everything in your head.”

“OK.”

“So if it’s everything in your head, does it have thoughts?”

“All right, so now you’re going to say, what if that’s us and we’re stuck in a simulation?” Clarke jokes as she pushes Lexa with her hands until Lexa is against a wall.

“Well, how would we know?” Lexa asks and she can only stares, because it could be true but they would never know, or they can so Clarke quickly pinches her ribs causing her to yelp in surprise. “Ow!” Lexa laughs, swatting Clarke away.

“I think that settles it,” Clarke grins, turning to continue walking.

“I might have been programmed to go ‘ow’.” Lexa yells after her, holding her arms out.

“Ok! Clarke says, fluttering her hand dismissively. She turns away fully and starts walking, leaving Lexa to chase after her. Clarke returns quickly and jumps into her arms, with her legs around her waist. She’s kissing her and laughing and Lexa spins them around, forgetting how serious the conversation turned out to be if they just really listened.

* * *

Everything about their situation, about them is completely seamless and perfect.

Lexa is respectful, and quiet, and neat, and Clarke is pretty sure her favorite thing to do is read and curl up into Clarke’s side or when they kiss because they want to and doesn’t lead to anything other than the need to be close and feel each other, not necessarily is a sexual way but an intimate way and it’s perfect.

Clarke has lost count on how many times she has think of the word perfect.

She likes (loves) all the versions of Lexa she’s gotten to meet, but this version, the dressed down, comfortable Lexa who speaks in a soft voice and really likes it when Clarke plays with her hair might just be her favorite. She’s vulnerable, she’s free and she’s living instead of surviving. She likes this Lexa. She likes this version. She likes them.

She probably won’t ever get Lexa to admit these little vices, but just having her silently press into Clarke and hum in appreciation when Clarke’s fingers start working through her long, black hair is reward enough or when she traces her back tattoo that draws her in so much that sometimes she forgets it’s a forever piece and she wants to become one in Lexa’s life it’s more than enough.

Instead of trying to avoid each other at every turn, Clarke finds herself gravitating to Lexa like a magnet, no matter where she is in the house. She just likes the sense of comfort she feels when she’s next to her, even if they aren’t necessarily talking. Clarke likes the reminder that she’s real, that they’re real.

Just like this moment. They’re both in the bathtub. She’s laughing as she scoops a handful of soap and places it on her head in order to form a crown, while Lexa leans forward to grab some of her own, and her head knocks into Clarke’s nose, and they fall into soapy laughter at their awkward movements that aren’t awkward at all but simply theirs.

It’s simple, magical and it’s plain connection all at the same time.

Clarke pulls her into a kiss.

Lexa pulls her into her lap.

Clarke traces the tattoo on her back with her hands while Lexa traces her collarbone with her tongue.

Clarke is-

Lexa is-

They are-

It’s all so perfect that it has to end sometime, right?

* * *

She had to be careful what she wished for because not even a day later and something is off with Lexa. There’s something different when Clarke wakes up, because Lexa is not on bed with her, instead she’s staring right outside the window, to nowhere in particular and her devoid stare, her shoulders slumped and her face wearing the same troubled expression she had the night they were re-matched.

Lexa is distant. She’s stiff and almost cold, which is completely not her Lexa. It’s like a switch has flipped and she’s just a distracted shell of a person instead of her usual warm, gentle self. She walks over to her and wraps her arms around her waist from behind, but Lexa’s muscles tense where they usually give, and her smile falters where it usually shines.

The look disappears just as quickly as it was on her. She tries to tickle her until she turns around and she immediately kisses her to distract her to the fact that she was crying.

“You ok?” She asks, frowning when she fully registers her look.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Lexa says detached of emotion. 

“All right.” Clarke nods, she doesn’t want to push it. She will let her come to her own, in her own terms and she will always be there when she does.

“I’m good.” She believes her.

* * *

They head to the park the way they always do, but Lexa is uncharacteristically lethargic instead of radiant and full of energy.

Clarke is used to her telling jokes, and making little quips and bantering with her as usual, but instead today she’s withdrawn and distracted and so melancholy that Clarke doesn’t know what to do or say.

They go to the lake and Clarke skips stones across the water, and Lexa merely watches.

Clarke watches as every stone she tosses skips 4 times.

Just like every time she does.

No matter how many times she throws it, it’s always 4 perfect skips.

“Have you ever had more than four or less than four?” Clarke asks her, as she stares out over the lake, not once looking back at her, because she’s in a trance as she watches another one skip 4 times.

When she doesn’t hear a response she turns back just in time as Lexa fumbles with something in her pocket.

“What are you thinking about?” Clarke asks.

Lexa shakes her head in response. “Nothing,” She verbally says. Lexa picks a stone of her own and tosses it; it bounces 4 times and sinks.

Clarke wraps her arms around Lexa’s waist, and rests her head on her shoulder. Lexa just rests her hand over Clarke’s arm and rubs it up and down.

And the feeling of despair starts to settle in.

* * *

They head to the hub, in the candle shaped building, and Lexa is increasingly becoming more agitated as the day goes on. They get to the bottom of the escalator and Clarke feels the frustration boiling over inside of her.

“All right, seriously, what’s up?” Clarke asks, concern all over her face.

“I looked,” Lexa simply says.

“Looked at what?” Clarke hopes she misheard her. Clarke shakes her head uncomprehending and Lexa just stares at her with the saddest looking face until suddenly it all makes sense. Clarke’s heart drops. “We promised we wouldn’t. We shook on it!” Clarke says her voice low and calm. She can feel the anger building, but she’s forcing herself to stay in control by wringing her hands and clenching her jaw and practically willing herself to just handle it. She doesn’t want to yell, not at Lexa. Not right now.

“Don’t you wanna know what it said?” Lexa asks.

She doesn’t.

She doesn’t want to know how many months or years or hell days they got left. “No. That was the point!” She’s disappointed that Lexa went back on her word, but more importantly, she’s terrified, because if Lexa’s face is any indication of the time, then it’s final.

“Well it’s almost done anyway.” Lexa practically grits her teeth and looks away. Clarke can tell she’s annoyed. That only makes her feel a little better because at least the idea of leaving is upsetting Lexa, too. For a while Clarke was thinking the issue had to do with her . So at least she still has that. “How almost done?” Clarke asks quickly.

“We’ve got like an hour.” Lexa looks up at her with regret before her eyes shift back to the floor and Clarke wishes she could look at her.

“Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

“I didn’t want to spoil today.”

“And this hasn’t spoiled it.” She wants to stop the tears welling behind her eyes. Clarke hisses through clenched teeth, her throat constricts and it’s just so much to process.

She knew the expiration date would always be a thing, an eventual situation they’d have to face sooner or later, but she was really hoping, wishing on later. She wasn’t stupid or naïve to think it could last forever but she was starting to think that they could have beaten it if they had more time.

She was starting, if not there yet, to think that she couldn’t fathom the idea of her and Lexa ever ending it.

It felt impossible.

It still feels impossible.

“It was supposed to be five years, but now…” Lexa starts. “I looked at it, something happened, it started going down. I don’t know what it was.“

“So you broke it?” Clarke finally yells and pushes her chest while she says it. 

“No! No, no, no. I mean. I don’t…I don’t know!”

“Why did you have to look at it?”

“Look, I was thinking maybe we could overcome it somehow.” Lexa takes a step towards Clarke but Clarke takes a step back.

“Why did you have to look at it?” Clarke repeats, her voice shaking.

“Because I love you.” Lexa blurts out. “I really, really love you,” she repeats, softer this time.

Clarke feels sick. “For fuck’s sake. And that wasn’t enough?”

Wasn’t their love enough?

Hasn’t she shown her that she feels the same even though that thought just occurred to her now but she has been thinking about it for so long.

“That’s not the point. I looked, but that’s not the issue here.”

“Are you sure about that?” Clarke scoffs and Lexa fumes. “You’re more wound up about that than how short the time is!”

“Yes, because we had agreed.” Clarke says defeated, a tear rolling down her face. She pushes her again when she comes closer. “Listen, listen. What if we just ignore it?”

“We can’t.”

“Listen, we’ll just fuck the system. We’ll fuck it.”

“And do what?” Clarke argues.

“We’ll jump out, over the wall, get out.” Lexa explains desperately.

“There is nothing out there.” She doesn’t know for sure but she figures there’s nothing. Nothing like them right now.

“How would you know?” When Clarke glances back worriedly she does the same and there’s a couple of people staring at them and one guard is standing right behind them, eying them warily. “Clarke-“

“You’ve ruined this.” Clarke pulls herself from Lexa’s grip and turns to walk away. “You’ve ruined it.”

“Clarke.”

“Don’t follow me.”

“Clarke, I’m sorry.” Lexa cries out one last time. But she’s far away.

She doesn’t know where to go or what to do, all she knows is that the tears are clouding her vision, and her stomach hurts so bad that when she rounds the corner out of sight she sinks to her knees and hunches over and screams into her hands.

* * *

She doesn’t feel anything, or if she does it’s not anger, it’s just disappointment, its loss.

She doesn’t blame Lexa, not really. In fact, if Lexa hadn’t looked at the date, Clarke knows she would have eventually cracked. Lexa was just quicker to do it because she loves her.

Just the memory of her confession sends her into overdrive. Lexa loves her.

The thought makes her dizzy, because it’s exactly the feeling she was keeping in for so long.

Lexa is equally brave as stupid because she actually said it out loud and she broke the promise, and even though it was horrible timing, the fact remains that she actually loves her.

She loves her and Clarke has loved Lexa since the very first day. Since she clumsily dropped her fork, since she spat on her shoe, since she told her the first night the slept together that she never felt so connected to anyone and how she felt the same.

She finds herself thinking about Lexa with every new person she meets, and she knows it’s wildly pathetic and terribly inappropriate, because she’s just aloof, she’s just surviving and not putting any effort on the new relationships the system pairs her with, but she hardly has the capacity to care. These people don’t matter, they’ll never matter, because they aren’t her.

And it’s one after the other after the other until Clarke doesn’t even know how many people she’s been with since she’s last seen Lexa.

They’re just faces and bodies and she doesn’t even care.

Until she does.

A few days later, it happens.

The notification.

The alert to end all alerts.

The one.

Her ultimate match.

Clarke is swimming, trying to clear her mind of green eyes and laughter lines, but failing spectacularly, when the AI goes off.

_Congratulations, Clarke. Your ultimate match has been identified. Your pairing day is tomorrow._

It makes her pause in her steps. “Ultimate as in the one?” Clarke swallows heavily.

_That is correct._

“And we meet tomorrow?”

_That is correct. Tomorrow you’ll be coupled with your ultimate match and together you will leave this place forever._

“Ok…Are you allowed to tell me anything about them?” Clarke asks weakly. Her knees are shaking. “Do I know them already?” She hopes, she does. She hopes it’s her but-

_Negative._

_“_ Right.”

_There is one more thing._

“Yeah, and what’s that?”

_Prior to pairing day, you have been allocated a short farewell period with an individual of your choosing._

“A farewell period? Like I get to say goodbye to someone?"

_That is correct. Data shows this can help provide psychological closure._

“Lexa! I choose Lexa.” Clarke bursts immediately, there’s no way she could not say her name.

_Your choice has been registered._

There’s a spring in her step as she hurries down to the entrance when she stops for a while.

“Wait. Where are we meeting?”

_Usual booth, 7:30 p.m_

“Right.”

“Coach?”

_Yes, Clarke?_

“Count to 4,” she says, and she tosses the AI across the pool, watching it skip 4 times before sinking to the bottom.

It stays there and she doesn’t get it back immediately as it used to.

* * *

She walks quickly, to the point where she’s almost running and she finally breathes when she sees her in their usual booth, wide eyed, hopeful and watching her timidly.

She must be thinking that she still mad but that’s far from it and she lets her know once she stands up and Clarke wraps her arms around her neck and she kisses Lexa like they don’t have time because they don’t or maybe they do and it’s just the start.

They reluctantly break apart, when Lexa picks up the AI and takes a seat while Clarke takes a seat right beside her. “Wait, wait. How long have we got?”

The Ai shows an hour.

Lexa slams her hand on the table, the cutlery makes a riveting sound and Clarke jumps with it until she pulls Lexa again against her and kisses her again and again.

“Look, the system’s set my pairing day for tomorrow.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“Right. I don’t want whoever the system reckons the one is, ok? I want you.”

“I want you.” Clarke replies at the same time, staring into Lexa’s eyes.

_Failure to comply with the system-_

“You can fuck off!” Lexa says, turning her AI over and ignoring It while she feels great not having her own with her, not since the pool.

Clarke grins.

_May result in banishment._

“Can you remember where you were before you came here?” Clarke asks. That’s been a recurring question in her head, she sees Lexa think and think and she knows what she’s thinking. “You can’t, can you?”

“No?” Lexa shakes her head.

“Me neither.” All she can remember is Lexa.

“Why can’t I think of that?”

“It’s a test. Do you remember the first night that we were together? I mean the first night, how did you feel?”

“I felt safe, happy, comfortable. It felt right.”

She felt that too.

She still does.

“It felt like something locked into place, like we’d met before.”

“Like it had happened before and it’ll happen again, like it’s happened a thousand times over and over again. Do you know what it means?” Clarke is almost in frenzy, her eyes wide and excited, like she’s trying to convey so much to Lexa.

She chooses Lexa. She will always be with her Lexa.

“Yeah.”

They had done it before, and they will do it again.

“Yeah. Yeah, I do.” Lexa glances warily over her shoulder, looking around the restaurant and Clarke follows her eyes. There’s people watching them. There’s the silence of the AI which is rare.

There’s guards eyeing them warily.

And then there’s them.

“Ever since we met this world has been toying with us, trying to keep us apart. It’s a test, I swear it is and the two of us, rebelling against it together is something to do with passing it” Clarke wraps her hands around Lexa’s neck.

“We’ve gotta fuck it all off.”

“Exactly. We’ve just gotta fuck the whole thing off and go.

“Yeah, over the wall.”

“Right over it. No matter what’s out there.”

“Ok.”

“So let’s go.”

“Yeah, let’s go.” Lexa smiles, and she takes Clarke’s hand in hers pulling her to standing.

The time ticks down to zero weirdly enough as if rebelling had caused the device to recalibrate and give them just a couple of seconds.

They both look around at the other patrons of the restaurant. Everyone is staring at them, like they’re some sort of spectacle but motionless.

They simply watch.

 Lexa takes Clarke by the hand and they begin to head for the exit.

One of the guards begins to walk forward menacingly, his Taser out and pointed at them, ready to strike.

Lexa tries to position herself so Clarke is behind her, but Clarke just pulls her behind her as if she was going to protect her.

They just wanted to protect each other.

Clarke reaches forward and places her hand right on the electric current of the gun, but it does nothing. It only stops time and everyone around them. 

Everyone but her and Lexa.

And they make a run for it.

They head straight for the wall, passing everyone and everything that remained frozen.

When they finally reach the wall, which is huge and seems impossible to climb, a ladder appears and it leads to the top.

“Come on.” Clarke confidently says. They begin the long climb. The more they go up, the landscape starts to disappear and then all of the sudden it shifts. The grass, the buildings, the houses and the lights in the distance are all fading to black.

They’re suddenly at the top and Clarke realizes and they’re in a black empty room, with shiny black and white dots on the floor and black walls that looks like the holding hub of a spacecraft. Clarke and Lexa walk through it, hand in hand, surprised to find that they are not the only couple to rebel.

Dozens of others are standing there looking around, holding each other, frantically wondering what comes next.

And that’s when they realize that the couples look just exactly like them.

It’s them.

And they remember each and every one of them.

Like the time they met in an apocalyptic world full of districts and arenas.

When they were in the sea.

Or the time where they were the high school sweethearts.

Or Lexa was a lawyer and Clarke her client.

Or Clarke was a doctor and Lexa was her patient.

Or the time they were fighting for their lives in a zombie apocalypse.

Or the time they were living amongst robots and more AI.

When they met when they were older, way older.

When they met when they were just newborns.

When the sky met the earth.

When she was Heda and Clarke was Wanheda. (That’s the only one that doesn’t have a number yet.)

A number pops up over their heads 998, and Clarke looks around to see that there are numbers over each couple.

  1. 207\. 210. 214. 304. 306. 307. 500. 732. 892. 990.



Lexa is looking around just as bewildered until each variation of Lexa and Clarke begins to fade in front of them.

One by one they blur from focus and seem to get sucked up into the ceiling, adding to a total count that is projected on a big screen in front of them. The number rises of completed simulations until eventually they reach to 995 and they both get taken up into the sky, and their total simulation is numbered.

The big board counts up the totals and displays the results.

1000 Simulations completed.

998 Rebellions logged.

99.8% Match.

* * *

Clarke never had any luck in the romantic department so when Raven convinced her that she needed to sign up to this dating site that used a true algorithm that took into consideration her preferences and other secret factors that would ultimately pair her with her soulmate, she had to try.

Raven was a fine example of finding the one.

Anya.

And she wanted that.

She wanted someone.

She wanted her.

So now it happens that she has found the one.

She’s apparently 99.8% compatible with someone.

And not just with someone but with her.

She looks again at her cellphone just outside the door where she was supposed to meet her and all she can see is green eyes, a chiseled by the gods bone structure, specially her jaw, her sensual lips and-

“What are you waiting for? Anya checked. She’s inside and she’s totally hot.” Raven pushes her through the doors and Clarke can’t help but roll her eyes at her friend, masking her nervousness and excitement she feels just at the thought of seeing her.

Seeing Lexa.

She looks for her until she finally lands on Lexa.

she has this feeling in her gut that mostly leaves her breathless for a second.

 She stares at her, and Clarke watches as her eyes recognize her and a full smile stretches across her face just like the one she was wearing before and the one she’s sporting now.

She looks at her like she knows her, and it’s a feeling that Clarke has, too.

It feels like everything clicks into place and everything makes so much sense.

This is right, whatever it is.

“You’re the one…”


End file.
